


Impatient to Be Free

by idiopathicsmile



Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - 1950s, Alternate Universe - Always a Different Sex, Content warning: internalized homophobia, Content warning: period-typical homophobia and sexism, F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-16
Updated: 2020-10-19
Packaged: 2021-03-09 00:35:09
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 19,137
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27045832
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/idiopathicsmile/pseuds/idiopathicsmile
Summary: In a way, it was almost a relief to see that nothing had changed since school. Seasons came and went but Grantaire was still Grantaire: a bundle of too-tight nerves and awkward elbows, scratchy throat, furtive gaze bouncing everywhere it shouldn’t. Still nursing a fascination with the most dangerous-looking female in the area. A puppy dog panting after a wolf.In 1957, female cartoonist Grantaire meets some interesting new people, joins a secret society, and attracts the notice of a woman named Enjolras. A 1950’s lesbian Amis AU.
Relationships: Enjolras/Grantaire (Les Misérables)
Comments: 229
Kudos: 425
Collections: Recs from the Watchalong Room





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * Translation into 中文-普通话 國語 available: [【翻译】Impatient to Be Free](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27574462) by [Function](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Function/pseuds/Function)



> The Daughters of Bilitis were a real-life lesbian rights group, founded in San Francisco in 1955. There was a Chicago arm of the DOB at least by 1959, but my understanding is that they were more of a social group; I’ve invented a lot for this story.
> 
> The DOB did some complicated things—we’ll get into a bit of that—but ultimately, this is my way of paying tribute to their courage and hard work in a very frightening time. I did a fair amount of research, and there will be historical notes after each section, but I still can’t guarantee I haven’t made mistakes. 
> 
> Content warnings for period-typical sexism, period-typical homophobia, and some internalized homophobia.
> 
> Title comes from “Secret Love,” sung by Doris Day in the 1953 film _Calamity Jane._
> 
> A great many thanks to my betas, who were just phenomenally helpful!

_ August 1957 _

“Grantaire, you look even paler than usual,” said Murray. He didn’t try that hard to hide his laughter. “Are you sure you’re alright?”

“I’m fine,” she said, too quickly.

“You’ll need to set aside your small-town attitudes if you want to succeed in the big city,” Chester added. “There’s all sorts here, as you can see.”

Grantaire nodded. There was nothing more dangerous than someone desperate to prove they were more Bohemian than you, she thought. She wondered if they were only doing this because she had corrected Chester about Rothko back at the office. Maybe she should’ve kept her mouth shut. She could have just let him be wrong and avoided the whole adventure, or prank, or byzantine hazing ritual–whatever had inspired them to take her here, of all places.

The Musain. Run by the mob, of course, but that wasn’t what made the place so notorious. There wasn’t exactly a neon sign screaming  _ gay bar! _ But even if Grantaire was as naive and inexperienced as Chester and Murray seemed to assume, she figured anyone could’ve put the clues together herself from the clientele, men mingling with men and women mingling with women. 

How much looking was too much looking? It all felt like too much. She tried focusing on the grimy wall of bottles behind the bar, except one of the bartenders had hung a poster of a pin-up girl back there—naked but for a strategically-placed ukulele, and grinning a slick, lipsticky grin. There was no safe real estate to rest your eyes on. Every inch was dangerous, an admission of something.

“I’ll be right back,” she croaked. “Ladies’ room.”

“If you can tell which one it is,” laughed–Chester? Murray?–who even cared, she thought, ducking into the crowd.

The water did not help like she’d hoped. Grantaire switched off the tap and wiped at her face, badly wanting a cigarette. She wondered how much longer she could hide in here before it got suspicious. Two or three minutes, she figured, but when she stepped back into the bar she’d need to be perfectly composed.

Then again, neither of her new colleagues seemed too perceptive. Case in point: this present stunt, designed to unnerve her in an entirely different direction. Even now, she could at least detect a certain sick humor about the whole affair. She was still half-smirking when a woman walked in. Grantaire looked away on instinct, but foolishly, right into the mirror, where their eyes met. There was just no catching a break tonight.

Grantaire had seen the stranger already from the other side of the bar, would have noticed her from a hundred paces. She looked to be Chinese or Japanese, Grantaire had no idea. She was tall and athletic, dressed like a man in a button-down shirt and trousers. Normally a girl of that stature slouched, pulled in her shoulders as if apologizing for taking up the space, but every line of this woman’s body was utterly assured, self-possessed. Her dark hair was cropped short, and there was a stark beauty in her strong brows and sharp cheekbones, feminine without a trace of softness.

Her eyes slid to Grantaire and away again: registered and dismissed in a single motion.

Grantaire dried her hands—slowly, because she still did not really want to go back. Anything was preferable, maybe including the slings and arrows of a stranger’s indifference.

In a way, it was almost a relief to see that nothing had changed since school. Seasons came and went but Grantaire was still Grantaire: a bundle of too-tight nerves and awkward elbows, scratchy throat, furtive gaze bouncing everywhere it shouldn’t. Still nursing a fascination with the most dangerous-looking female in the area. A puppy dog panting after a wolf.

Grantaire snorted, echoing in the cramped space. The woman looked back at her.

“Sorry,” Grantaire mumbled.

The woman raised an eyebrow. “Your friends seem to be having a good time,” she said. Her voice was cold and dry as the Arctic Desert. Searing sun, powdery snow.

Chester and Murray weren’t friends by any stretch of the imagination. They were barely co-workers; Grantaire had only been at the magazine for five days, had only arrived in the city three days before that. Had been hired sight unseen by the eccentric editor-in-chief on the strength of a portfolio sent by mail and a first name that could pass as a man’s. It was even odds that once the bossman returned from his honeymoon and discovered his brand-new cartoonist was a she, Grantaire would be right out the door again, no chance to slip a single drawing into the lineup. As it was, her presence at the office had the air of a lingering typo.

Best-case scenario, her new employer would turn out to be one of those awful tyrants who refused to acknowledge any degree of fallibility, and he’d keep her on out of sheer hardheadedness. Perhaps after a year or two, she’d fade from a novelty to a background detail, and she’d finally grow up enough to stop trying to prove herself when it mattered the least.

None of it was worth explaining.

“They’re harmless,” said Grantaire instead. “That new intellectual type. They like modern art and smoking marijuana and pretending to understand poetry. They’re not here to gawk, not really.” She could not make herself shut her mouth. It was like having a fit. “They only brought me to try to get a rise out of the girl from Skokie,” she was saying. “They’ve got nothing against your kind.”

“My kind,” the woman repeated, and inwardly, Grantaire flinched. Was it rude to imply someone was a homosexual simply because she was wearing trousers at a gay bar? It didn’t look like a costume; she wore it with too much grace. “Don’t you mean ‘our kind’?” the woman said.

Grantaire froze, still clutching a wad of paper towel. She hadn’t expected to feel caught out. She had almost hoped for it when she first walked through the door, with some slight terrified swoop of the stomach. One foot inside the Musain, one glance at the flesh-and-blood patrons flirting under threat of police raid, had put it to rest.

Grantaire could only stand there, in the drab skirt and blouse she had picked specifically to blend in at the office, and measure the distance between the two of them in miles, in light years.

She threw the paper towel in the trash, made herself meet the woman’s eyes. Grantaire was a head shorter, but somehow it was her spine that craned down, her shoulder blades that pulled together, her posture that begged forgiveness for the sheer fact of her blood and muscle and skin.

“I’m nothing like you,” said Grantaire.

“Really?” came the reply, unimpressed. “Because I could’ve sworn I saw you in here yesterday. Minus your friends.”

It had to be a bluff, thought Grantaire. Without two rowdy men at her back to make the whole thing a joke, she had barely managed to step in before she’d hightailed it back out.

Her thoughts raced. The odds that anyone had seen her, let alone well enough to recognize her again later—then again, given Grantaire’s luck, it wasn’t impossible that she’d been definitively spotted. 

It had to be a bluff, unless it wasn’t.

First Chester and Murray, and now this. Grantaire had just about had it with people trying to shock her by telling her things she already knew.  _ Sex perverts exist, Grantaire _ , on one hand.  _ You’re one of them, Grantaire, on the other. _

At some point, a girl reached her limit.

“Oh,” said Grantaire, “I’m a Lesbian, if that’s what you’re getting at.”

The woman blinked at her, not expecting—what? The directness? The word? The slightest illusion of a backbone?

Grantaire bared her teeth in a grin: another illusion. Nothing but well-honed reflex at this point; every bone in her body knew how to lie.

“And that’s the beginning and end of what we have in common,” Grantaire said. It had been a long day; she gave herself the petty satisfaction of slamming the bathroom door on her way out.

“Feeling better?” Chester asked, all mock-sympathy, when she returned. “Maybe a ginger-ale to settle your stomach?” It had the shape of an offer but the taste of a dare: can you stay long enough to drink it.

“Throw in some whiskey and you’ve got yourself a deal,” she said, all bravado, the sound of the door still echoing in her ears. Murray laughed. Her head hurt.

“Don’t look now, but there’s a woman, if you can call it that, watching us,” said Murray in a low, amused voice. “Think she’s got her eye on you, Grantaire.”

For once in her life, she wouldn’t rise to take the bait. “You’re hilarious,” said Grantaire without looking up. “A regular Bob Hope.”

“They still laughing at Bob Hope out in Skokie?” Chester said.

“It’s Illinois,” she snapped, “not the Mesozoic Era.”

“Mesozoic,” said Murray, as though he’d never heard anything so ridiculous. “Big word for a little lady.”

_ Mesozoic _ . Eight letters. But it didn’t matter how you contorted yourself; somebody would always find a way to be sore at you for being too much of one thing or another.

Grantaire hunched down on the stool, away from the sweep of those imagined eyes, and forced herself to smile.

“Good morning,” said Chester. “Is that a new dress?”

It was not. Grantaire looked up warily from her sketchpad. She wasn’t good-looking enough for this to be anything but a ploy.

“Do you need something, Chester?” she asked in her sweetest voice, all cotton candy fumes.

“Secretary’s out this morning,” he told her. “That’s why there’s no coffee yet.”

And there, it all clicked into place. 

Grantaire schooled her face as blank as she could make it; if she was going to reach his conclusion, he’d have to drag her there.

“Thank you, but I picked up a cup on my way here,” she said, nodding at her half-empty Styrofoam cup. Still stuck on Friday’s disaster at the Musain, she had been unable to even imagine the Monday morning L ride to the office without a fortifying blast of caffeine. 

Chester stared meaningfully; Grantaire stared back, meaningless.

“Grantaire,” said Chester, as if talking to one very stupid, “do you think you could brew us a pot?”

Grantaire blinked. “Does this normally fall to the staff cartoonist when the secretary’s away?”

Chester made a suppressed sound of deep irritation. He spread his hands, appealing. “Listen, I could struggle through trying to make coffee for the office and no doubt poison everyone trying, or you could do it, and add that homey little touch I know all the fellas would appreciate.”

Homey. It was not a word you’d apply to Grantaire’s garden-level one-bedroom, which boasted stained wallpaper and a stove straight out of the Coolidge administration. Homely, maybe. Chester was the one with a home, and a wife, and a fat little baby and the money for a comfortable life.

“It’s only fair to divide the work according to natural aptitude, sweetheart,” Chester was saying, and it was the  _ sweetheart  _ that snapped Grantaire like a rubber band, that word deployed like a pat on the head, like penny candy for a crying baby, like a scrap of bologna to a dog, like it could only ever be the bitterest pity or the cruelest joke in concert with Grantaire’s face, with Grantaire’s entire being.

“‘From each according to their ability, to each according to their needs,’” she murmured in an agreeing tone.

“Now you got it,” Chester started, then frowned.

“Karl Marx, Chester,” said Grantaire. “Keep up, or someone might need to place a call to ol’ Joe.”

Chester’s entire countenance soured. “This is why you should leave it to the men to make the jokes,” he said, “and stick to what you can do—”

Grantaire stood. “I’ll make the coffee,” she said.

“There,” said Chester, “did that need to be such a production?”

The “Golden Ratio,” according to a high school Home Economics course which Grantaire had frankly passed by the skin of her teeth, was one to two tablespoons of coffee for every six ounces of hot water. Grantaire remembered this by virtue of having gotten it wrong many, many times. She was no good with math, but the machine took thirty-six ounces of water, which meant the ideal amount of grounds was somewhere between six and twelve tablespoons.

“Stars shining bright above you,” Grantaire hummed under her breath, measuring and dumping coffee grounds into the filter.  _ One, two, three, four, five. _

Grantaire had gotten it wrong in high school because nobody in her house drank coffee. She hadn’t discovered the jolting benefits herself until her first year of art school, as the deadlines began to pile and the available time to meet them began to wane.

“Night breezes seem to whisper, I love you,” Grantaire went on.  _ Six, seven, eight, nine, ten. _

If there had been a way to brave the choppy academic waters of work and criticism without chemical assistance, that path had been invisible to Grantaire. She had tried, she had cried, she had turned down “diet pills” that the other girl in her program swore by only because Grantaire figured she couldn’t afford to risk shrinking her already tiny tits.

“Birds singing in the sycamore trees—”  _ Eleven, twelve. Thirteen, fourteen, fifteen. _

The scrutiny and the pressure tempered the freedom of those heady days away from her parents. The expectation that Grantaire was only studying art as a way of killing time, until some charitable man came along to marry her,  _ unless the poor dear simply couldn’t find anyone _ —she had found a survival strategy of her own, a roughly stitched-together patchwork of sarcasm and wine and more sarcasm, and coffee brewed so thick and strong her own blood was no doubt half-caff at this point.

“Dream a little dream of me.”  _ Sixteen, seventeen, eighteen, nineteen, twenty.  _ Grantaire went ahead and dumped in the rest of the bag.

Grantaire was making shaky progress on her first deadline when Douglas stopped by her desk.

“Listen,” he blustered, “is this some kind of a joke?”

“Hm?”

“Your coffee’s undrinkable, it’s—” he faltered as Grantaire took a long swallow of the tarry substance in her mug. It was gritty and bitter, but by the standards of her art school years, only qualified as “medium.”

“Doug,” she said calmly, “if it’s too strong for you, you’re free to add plenty of milk and sugar.” She took another sip, meeting his eyes all the while. 

He spun on the heel of his dress shoe. As he stormed away, she could hear him mutter, at a passive-aggressive volume designed to be just-barely audible, but audible nonetheless,  _ “No wonder she doesn’t have a man yet, can’t even make coffee right.” _

“Grantaire?”

She looked up. The secretary was back from wherever she’d been, apparently.

“Hello,” said Grantaire, hoping that if she kept a friendly enough countenance, the secretary might not notice that Grantaire did not remember her name. “Are you feeling better?”

The secretary smiled, polite. She was young but plain, although not as plain as Grantaire. “Thank you, it was my mother, actually. She’s a little under the weather, so I stopped home to bring her some soup and heat it up for her.”

Grantaire nodded as if that kind of filial duty was a part of her daily life, too. “Well, I hope her condition improves soon.”

“Thank you, that’s very kind.”

An awkward pause began to bloom. Into it, Grantaire blurted, “Sorry if you had the coffee.”

“Oh,” said the secretary, “no, no, I drink tea.” Of course she did, thought Grantaire. She had the look of someone well acquainted with the proper use of a cup and saucer. In another life, she might have been a librarian. She lowered her voice slightly. “Douglas informed me all about this morning’s adventure with the percolator.” She lowered her voice a little more. “In some detail.”

“Yes, I must have lost count spooning in the grounds,” said Grantaire blandly. “I can’t imagine how it slipped my mind.”

“I can,” said the secretary with a crooked smile. Somehow, with both eyes wide open, she gave the impression of winking. “Say, Grantaire. I don’t suppose you could take your lunch break with me? There’s a park across the street, it’s very quiet. Peaceful.” 

Grantaire nodded, unsure of precisely what was happening. Was she about to be filled in on the office gossip? Did Murray have a gambling problem?

“Good,” said the secretary. That crooked smile again. “My name is Combeferre, by the way.”

“You know, I saw you the other day,” said Combeferre, squinting a little in the sun as she removed an orange from her bag.

“Did you.” Grantaire ran through her mental list of places she’d been over the past several days. If she was very, very lucky, maybe Combeferre simply meant that she’d glimpsed Grantaire at the Jewel, picking up some groceries for her tragically empty fridge.

Combeferre glanced around the park in a very natural, off-hand way. “At the Musain,” she said.

Grantaire’s stomach dropped. She could feel her grip on her turkey sandwich going white-knuckled.

“Chester and Murray, such a pair of jokesters,” she said at last. “I suppose I was being hazed last night—”

“No, I saw you Thursday,” said Combeferre quietly. “By yourself.”

Grantaire hadn’t been in there for more than forty-five seconds. Had all of Chicago seen? She felt something bubble up inside her.

“So,” said Grantaire, trying to match Combeferre’s even, calm voice. “Is this blackmail, then? I’m afraid you’ll have to wait until I’ve gotten my first paycheck, I’m a bit light at the moment.”

Combeferre blinked. “Oh dear,” she said, “oh no, you misunderstand me completely. I saw you from inside.”

“You were there?” said Grantaire, feeling very dumb for not having picked up on any sign of Sapphism earlier. There was nothing obvious in Combeferre’s manner or dress. The comment about stopping home to see her mother might have suggested she was still living with her parents, and thus unmarried, but plenty of girls did that. Of course, not every woman of a woman-loving bent chose to broadcast it to the world like that short-haired Amazon in the bar restroom. Combeferre’s hairdo and clothes were no doubt chosen for hiding, like Grantaire’s.

“Do you have plans this weekend?” Combeferre asked, and Grantaire attempted not to look entirely pole-axed. 

Was this a pass? Grantaire felt no immediate pull, but, wretchedly, realized she was lonely enough to consider it. She raised her eyebrows.

“You see, I belong to a social organization,” Combeferre continued, unaware. “We could use some new members, and it would be so nice to know someone else at work—”

“Is it a book group?” said Grantaire. “A Tupperware exchange? A cat appreciation society?”

Combeferre smiled. “I do like cats,” she said. “No, we’re. Hm. The Chicago branch of a group of like-minded individuals who find ourselves on a slightly divergent path from the majority of mankind. It’s a very relaxed, informal thing. We’re meeting at the apartment of a friend for spaghetti dinner on Saturday. I can give you the details if you’re interested.”

“And you’re all women?” Grantaire said.

“We are,” said Combeferre.

What the Hell. It wasn’t as if there were people lining up to make Saturday night plans with her.

“Alright,” said Grantaire.

“Wonderful.” Combeferre gave her an address, in what Grantaire suspected was a slightly nicer part of town than her own hovel. Her eyes briefly scanned the park again. “And I should add that you don’t have to use your real name,” she said. “In fact, I think most of us don’t.”

“Some Tupperware club you’re running, lady,” said Grantaire, and Combeferre half-laughed.

“I was going to leave you a note,” said Combeferre, “on your desk, explaining everything in advance, but then my mother was sick and there wasn’t any time.”

“If anyone saw what you wrote,” Grantaire started.

“In shorthand, of course. None of the men would understand.”

“I can’t read shorthand,” said Grantaire. “I took a course on it, but that was about the time I realized my future would need to lie elsewhere.”

“I was going to be a physician,” said Combeferre distantly. Grantaire turned to face her. “I had the grades, you know. Biology was my best subject, and I enjoy helping people.”

“What happened?” Grantaire asked uneasily.   
  
“Oh,” said Combeferre. “I had a marvelous professor. I’d asked him about medical school, and he pulled me aside and explained that I’’d have to do twice the work for half the respect, which was of course the truth. I considered nursing, but a life of emptying bedpans and dodging the head doctor’s wandering hands didn’t appeal, and I’ve always been an excellent typist.”

“So instead you empty inboxes and dodge Richard’s wandering hands,” said Grantaire. 

“You’ll fit right in,” Combeferre said with another smile. “I’m sorry about what my friend said to you last night. She has an excellent heart and is a key part of our set, but she can be somewhat severe.”   
  
Grantaire nearly dropped her sack lunch. “Do you mean the Hippolyta who cornered me in the powder room?”

“Undoubtedly,” said Combeferre. Then, “oh, and definitely don’t call her that.”

“Wouldn’t dream of it,” said Grantaire.

  
  



	2. Chapter 2

The meeting turned out to be not far from Grantaire’s place, although on a street where the chipping paint and worn-down front steps seemed more charmingly Bohemian than just depressing.

The door was opened by a stocky brunette wearing a plaid shirt dress and bright red lipstick. She looked vaguely familiar, although given that this was only Grantaire’s second week in Chicago, it had to be a mirage.

Combeferre’s social club appeared to be in full swing. The small crowd of mostly professionally dressed women chatting to each other and eating crackers with cheese resembled a book club and not, as Grantaire had distantly perhaps both hoped and feared, a bacchanalian orgy.

“Hullo,” said the woman in the doorway, “I’m Bahorel, who are you? You don't have to give me your real name, not even your real first name.”

“I know,” said Grantaire, “I was briefed by—um, maybe I shouldn’t say.”

Bahorel shrugged as she let Grantaire in and closed the door behind her. “We go through it with all the first-timers. What the Hell should I call you, girlie?”

“Call me R,” said Grantaire. 

“Perfect, like a pirate!” said Bahorel with a grin. Her nose looked like it had been broken and mended a few times, giving her an enjoyably rakish air.

“Oh hey!” said Grantaire, “I know you, you’re the Petticoat Pugilist!”

“Yes,” said Bahorel, “although I hasten to add that I didn’t pick the name.”

“I saw you box in Springfield last summer,” Grantaire told her. “You’ve got a killer left hook.”

Bahorel lit up. “I remember that match! My god, I was so thrilled they didn’t make me box in heels, I felt like I could’ve KO’d Marciano himself.”

“I’d pay to see that,” said Grantaire, and Bahorel laughed.

“Oh, I’m a novelty act,” she said. “They book me when they can’t find a dog who can dance on his hind legs or a parrot who can whistle the Star-Spangled Banner. I love it, though. Lord knows we have enough reason to want to punch somebody in the kisser most of the time!”

Grantaire laughed, partly from surprise.

“Wonderful, you made it!” said Combeferre, materializing at Grantaire’s elbow. “There’s Jeanne,” she added, nodding at a small woman in a black hat festooned with what appeared to be a taxidermied crow. “She can introduce you to everyone.”

It turned out that Grantaire’s bathroom nemesis was in attendance, and she did indeed hate being called Hippolyta, almost as much as she hated being called Diana, Goddess of the Hunt.

“My name,” said the huntress in question through gritted teeth, her severe brows looking positively ferocious, “is Enjolras.”

“But it’s impeccable,” said Grantaire, “do you recall the myth of Actaeon? If anyone’s stare could sic fifty hunting hounds on some poor sap, it’s yours, Artemis.”

Enjolras glowered.

“You see,” said Grantaire in a hushed voice, “I can hear the dogs advancing as we speak.”

“Are you sure you don’t just hear your own words?” said Enjolras. “It sounds like barking to me.”

Grantaire grinned, sharp and bitter. “Are you calling me your hound? I’m flattered, truly. Us mere mortals can have no greater ambition than to sit, stay, or speak at your command.”

“How about  _ quiet _ ,” Enjolras shot back, “is that a command you follow.”

“Only if you scratch between my ears first,” said Grantaire. She let her smile tilt into something more provocative. She couldn’t explain why, but having Enjolras angry made her want to push, to disgust, to further illuminate the stinging distance between them like the awful clarity of tonguing a cut lip. “For a little petting,” she murmured, “I’d lie at your feet.” 

It seemed to work. Enjolras’s dark eyes flashed. A furious blush was beginning to bloom on her perfect cheekbones. She opened her mouth to reply.

“I believe it is time to start,” said a smiling curly-haired woman who had introduced herself as Courfeyrac. “Welcome to the Daughters of Bilitis.”

“That’s the name, really?” Grantaire blurted. “It sounds half like a patriotic group and half like a disease.”

“Bilitis was the beloved of Sappho in a work by Pierre Louÿs,” said Jeanne offhandedly. “French erotic poetry of middling quality.”

“Of course it’s middling, it was written by a man,” put in Bahorel.

“The organization could hardly file a charter for non-profit corporation status if we labeled ourselves a group of homosexual agitators,” said Combeferre.

“Is that what you are?” said Grantaire. “Agitators?”

Bahorel gave a small curtsey. 

“We put forth the notion that it’s OK to be us,” said Courfeyrac. “That’s agitation enough where I’m from.”

“The Daughters of Bilitis was founded about two years ago, in San Francisco,” said Enjolras. “We also have chapters in New York City, Los Angeles, and Rhode Island.”

“Rhode Island?” Grantaire repeated. “Where in Rhode Island, or do you have the entire state?”

“They didn’t specify,” said Enjolras with what sounded like great patience. “We have four stated goals. First, to educate the variant that she may better understand herself—”

“The Hell’s a variant?” Grantaire muttered.

“Use context,” said Enjolras with gratifyingly less patience. “Second, to educate the public so that we may break down their erroneous taboos and prejudices. Third, to participate in research conducted by responsible scholars who genuinely wish to know more about the homosexual, and fourth, to propose changes to the penal code as pertains to the homosexual.”

Grantaire nodded, taking this in. “Goal number five,” she said. “I was promised supper.”

  
Jeanne was apparently a poet of enough renown in the Beatnik circles to afford her own place from writing alone. Grantaire could only guess what that meant. Maybe Jeanne wrote great works of sexual deviance and got away with it because nobody could understand what she wrote. Maybe they could understand it, but assumed because she was a woman that it was all imagination. She seemed bright at any rate, and Grantaire decided to give her the benefit of the doubt that her poems were good, if likely weird.

At any rate, it had to be better than her cooking. The noodles were overboiled into mush. It was like eating dog food. 

“Sorry,” said Jeanne. “I was halfway through boiling the pasta when the perfect line occurred to me, and when I looked up from my notebook, it was pulverized.”

As they half-heartedly chewed, the members of the Daughters of Bilitis went around the circle and introduced themselves. Grantaire met Feuilly, who worked in a hat shop, Joly, an appropriately jolly-seeming nurse, and Joly’s girlfriend, Bossuet. Grantaire, who had never witnessed an affair between women last longer than a couple of nights, had to exert great energy not to stare.

“Our neighbors think we’re sisters,” said Bossuet, taking Joly’s hand.

“Very affectionate sisters,” Joly added. Grantaire opened her mouth to point out that Joly was white and Bossuet was Chicana and thought better of it.

“People see what they want to see,” said Combeferre. “There have been a number of psychological experiments on that theme, for example—”

Courfeyrac coughed gently.

“Our next matter on the agenda,” Combeferre said. “Recruitment.”

“Our San Francisco branch has more than two dozen members,” said Enjolras. “Now, granted, they were here first, but Chicago is over five times the size, and happy as I am to see all you here—”

Grantaire gave Enjolras her most grating simper. Enjolras did not have the decency to notice, instead chugging forward like a locomotive.

“—I know there has got to be a way to find more of us. Combeferre and I have tried approaching women in the local gay bars, since we can at least be sure of the demographic there—”

“That’s why you were at the Musain?” Grantaire broke in. “Shame on you, disappointing all the enterprising young sex perverts who weren’t there on business.”

“But,” said Enjolras, shooting Grantaire a dirty look (although not dirty enough), “the situation was less than ideal.”

“Recruiting at the bars is yielding diminishing returns,” Combeferre explained. “For one thing, it’s too much of a struggle to be heard above the noise.”

“You could pass out fliers,” said Grantaire before she could stop herself.

Enjolras sighed. She had clearly already thought of it. “We couldn’t include any information that would link back to us. If there was a raid and someone got nabbed with our flier, it could shut down the entire Chicago arm for good.”

“You could pass out blank pieces of paper,” said Grantaire, “and hope.”

“We were very lucky that Combeferre was able to make secondary contact with R at a mutual workplace,” Enjolras went on doggedly. “We cannot assume we will have that sort of luck again.”

Grantaire clasped her heart. “Luck, you say? Diana, you flatter! I blush, I swoon!”

“I told you to stop calling me that,” said Enjolras flatly.

“Before, I was calling you Huntress Diana of the Roman pantheon,” said Grantaire. “But now I’ve changed my tune. You’re Princess Diana of Themyscira.” And then, at Enjolras’s utterly flat look, “Wonder Woman? Good lord, Enjolras, take in some culture once in a while, this is embarrassing.”

“Comic books are for children,” Enjolras snapped.

“Ah, speaking of which,” said Courfeyrac. “And on the subject of recruitment.” All eyes moved to her. She cleared her throat. “A former student—R, I teach high school English—wrote me a letter from U of C to say among other things that she’s going for her teacher’s certificate after she graduates. I strongly suspect her to be, well, one of us. I thought I might see about sending her one of our newsletters, once she’s twenty-one, of course.”

Combeferre shook her head. “If you’re wrong and someone finds out—if you’re  _ right  _ and someone finds out—if anyone goes to your school with this…you have a good job, Courfeyrac. You have a good life. You could lose everything.”

“I know,” said Courfeyrac, “of course I know that. But I watch my students interact with each other. I remember the questions she asked in class, and there are a few parts of her letter hinting at an attachment with another female student—”

“Sometimes attachments don’t mean anything,” said Grantaire. She wished her voice was steadier. “It can be a phase.”

“And I’m aware of that,” said Courfeyrac. “But if I’m right—”

“Are we willing to gamble the safety of the group on it?” Enjolras said in a low voice.

“If I’m right, she could start another arm of the DOB at the teacher’s college,” said Courfeyrac, breathless. “We could catch an entire generation of girls at the start of their lives.”

“Good god,” Grantaire murmured, “you’re the shadowy cabal of sex criminals I’ve been warned about. Striking at the heart of the educational system, corrupting children, plotting your spread through every city—I mean, the spaghetti’s a bit of a surprise, I suppose—”

Grantaire broke off; Courfeyrac had gone a bit pale. Enjolras glared at Grantaire, but it was less fun this time.

“That was uncalled for, R,” said Combeferre.

“I’m fine,” said Courfeyrac briskly. “What’s our next item?”

“Whether we have anything to submit to  _ The Ladder,”  _ said Combeferre. “That’s our organization’s newsletter,” she added for Grantaire’s benefit. “Jeanne, any poems?”

“I’ve got one,” said Jeanne, “It’s about a storm but there are—relevant undertones.”

“Good,” said Combeferre. 

“I wrote two essays and I’m working on a third,” Enjolras said, her face strangely stoic.

“Good, good.” Combeferre nodded. “R, do you think you might draw something?”

Grantaire startled. “I…”

“Don’t put her on the spot, Jesus,” said Bahorel.

“She’s an artist,” said Combeferre.

At that, Grantaire had to laugh. “I assure you, there is an entire art school that would tell you otherwise. I’m a cartoonist. Different animal. Like comparing a fox to a poodle.”

“And which are you?” said Enjolras, the full focus of her stare on Grantaire once more. God, her eyes. 

“I think we’ve well established,” said Grantaire, “I’m a bitch.”

“Well, if you can hold a pen in your paw,  _ The Ladder _ could use you,” Courfeyrac announced, sounding perfectly cheerful. It was a startlingly fast turn-around. Maybe she took to heart all that baloney about women needing to smile.

“I don’t know anything about their style,” Grantaire protested.

“I have a back issue in my purse,” Joly offered, producing an enormous handbag. “It’s certainly in here somewhere.”

By the end of the meeting, Joly had managed to extract a paperback on infectious diseases, several shiny crystals, four handkerchiefs, a small anatomical model of the human heart, and finally the issue. The cover was a black and white drawing of a woman either taking off or putting on a harlequin mask.

Grantaire took it, feeling a little drawn in despite herself.

Courfeyrac reached for her coat. “I should head out,” she said. “I still need to tuck Michael in and say goodnight to Ed.”

“Michael and Ed are your very spoiled cats?” Grantaire guessed.

“My son,” said Courfeyrac. “And my husband.” 

Grantaire attempted not to react, but she had the feeling it didn’t pan out.

“I’ll get you a bag, Grantaire,” said Jeanne, jumping up, “for the newsletter.”

Bahorel clapped Grantaire on the back on her way out. “Good to meet you,” said Bahorel. “I have a feeling you’ll keep things interesting, Also, I have a bout next week if you’re interested—”

“I am,” said Grantaire, watching Enjolras chat with Feuilly on her way out the door. “Bye, Enjolras!”

Enjolras’s head whipped around. She looked Grantaire up and down and then left without a word.

By the time Jeanne returned with the bag, Grantaire had to run to catch up with Courfeyrac. 

In another life, Grantaire might’ve left it alone, and left herself to go wallow in pity over another wretched mistake. But the fact was, Grantaire was too well-acquainted with her own sense of shame. If she went easy on herself now, it would hurt much more later. Taking on the discomfort of saying something in the moment would forestall worse feelings later. A pain vaccine.

“Sorry,” Grantaire said.

“Oh,” said Courfeyrac. “For what?”

Grantaire hesitated. “For what I said at the meeting. My joke. It wasn’t funny.”

“It wasn’t, no,” said Courfeyrac. “But it wasn’t wrong, either.”

“And the comment about cats, that was also over the line. It made things uncomfortable for you.”

“ _ I _ make things uncomfortable for me,” said Courfeyrac lightly. She sighed, looked to make sure nobody else could hear, and added in an undertone, “Look, you know that moment when you realized, ‘My god, I’m not alone, there are others like me and I’m not the only one on the planet after all’?”

Grantaire nodded.

“Well,” said Coufeyrac. She gave a wan smile. “Mine came a bit too late, that’s all.”

“Sorry,” Grantaire said again.

“Oh don’t be,” said Courfeyrac, with what seemed like maybe practiced ease. “It isn’t your fault. Unless you happen to be the entire state of Georgia, which seems unlikely.”

“What’s her name?” said Grantaire.

“Hm?”

“The student.”

Courfeyrac nodded. “Cosette,” she said. Then, “You really should send in a cover to _The_ _Ladder._ There’s few enough of us that they’ll definitely use it at some point, and if you’re good enough to be a professional, all the better.”

“Courfeyrac,” said Grantaire, “did you give me that little speech so you could tug on my heartstrings enough to play me like a piano?”

“Now there’s a mixed metaphor,” said Courfeyrac. “You’ll need to watch yourself or you’ll irritate Jeanne.”

“Irritating people is my specialty,” said Grantaire.

“About that,” said Courfeyrac. She stopped walking and gave Grantaire a careful look. “Don’t wind up Enjolras like that unless you know what you’re doing.”

“Oh, I never do,” said Grantaire.

“I need a cab, I live on the other side of town,” said Courfeyrac, holding out one hand to hail a car. “But don’t say I didn’t warn you.”

“You know, you never actually answered my question,” said Grantaire, “about whether or not you were manipulating me.”

A taxi cab rolled to a stop in front of Courfeyrac. It was faster than Grantaire had ever gotten a cab, but then again, Grantaire didn’t have a flawless figure and a head full of perfect ringlets. Courfeyrac climbed inside.

“You know, you’re right,” said Courfeyrac. The door shut with a thunk and the car disappeared down the street.

  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Bahorel’s opening line is exactly what the greeters at Daughters of Bilitis events would say. 
> 
> Female boxers were at least nominally a thing in the 1950’s, and they were required to dress extremely ladylike when out of the ring, presumably because of an unspoken fear that a female boxer could conceivably be a lesbian. I think they didn’t generally have to fight in high heels but Phyllis Kugler, a woman boxer of the time, did promote matches by doing a fifteen-minute routine on a punching bag blindfolded, wearing a short skirt and heels. Marciano is a reference to Rocky Marciano, who held the world heavyweight title from 1952 to 1956.
> 
> The myth of Actaeon is that because he either spied on her naked or boasted he was a better hunter or for whatever reason, the Greek goddess Artemis (Diana if we’re being Roman about it) turned Actaeon into a stag and sicced her hunting dogs on him until they tore him apart and he died.
> 
> The Daughters of Bilitis were the first known lesbian rights organization in America. The most famous founding members are Phyllis Lyon and Del Martin, but it was originally the brainchild of Rose Bamberger, a Filipina immigrant who was looking for a place where she and her girlfriend could go dance, since bars and nightclubs weren’t safe. Bamberger didn’t envision a political group, and left when the group began to move in that direction. Taking the risk to organize was easier for the white middle-class members, and let’s not pretend that isn’t some bullshit. The DOB’s approach, especially in the 1950s, was more assimilationist than is really comfortable to read about in 2020 but they provided a key lifeline to women interested in other women at a time when that was a dangerous thing to be.
> 
> The branches of the DOB I named (San Francisco, Chicago, Los Angeles, New York City, Rhode Island) are what Wikipedia says was established by 1959, so it’s pretty possible some of them didn’t exist by this point in 1957, but I didn’t want to just guess and arbitrarily leave some out.
> 
> I have no idea how good “The Songs of Bilitis” was or wasn’t, I just figured it’s probably at least a little male gazey and also thought it would be funny if the poet of the group wasn’t into it.
> 
> They filed for non-profit corporation status in 1957. Phyllis Lyon said their group description on the paperwork was so vague and ambiguous, "it could have been a charter for a cat-raising club."
> 
> The four goals of the Daughters of Bilitis is paraphrased from the opening pages of their newsletter, _The Ladder._
> 
> Our San Francisco branch = the first chapter of the DOB.
> 
> Princess Diana of Themyscira = Wonder Woman, whose first issue came out in 1942.
> 
> Membership in the D.O.B. wasn’t open to anyone under 21. They didn’t want to be accused of corrupting minors.
> 
> “You could lose everything.” I can’t overstate how much this was true. From [an article](https://glreview.org/article/lesbian-liberation-begins/) written by prominent DOB members Del Martin and Phyllis Lyon in 1995: _“Lesbians and gay men, if found out, were subject to reprisals from all quarters of society: employers, police, military, government, family, and friends. After bar raids, police often informed employers or gave lists of arrestees to the newspapers. Parents disowned their adult children. Minors were sent to a shrink or were institutionalized and given shock (or other) treatments. Purges occurred periodically on military bases. Just having “tendencies” or being friends with lesbians could get you a court martial and a dishonorable discharge. Many people lost licenses and their professional careers. Lesbian mothers were denied custody of their children and even visitation rights in some cases. The law, religion, and psychiatry played prominent roles in the cruel treatment of lesbians and gay men by society and family. There was no sense of community as exists today. Lesbians were isolated and separated—and scared.”_
> 
>  _The Ladder_ featured essays, book reviews, letters to the editor, poems, and even short fiction.
> 
> I have no idea if Joly would’ve been into crystals as an alternative medicine thing in the 1950’s. Let’s just say she was carrying around some pretty rocks.
> 
> From what I’ve been able to find, it wasn’t that unusual for a member of the DOB to be married to a man.
> 
> To be clear, Jeanne gets Grantaire a bag for the newsletter because it would’ve been dangerous for Grantaire to carry it in the open. When newsstands eventually started carrying _The Ladder,_ they wrapped it in brown paper, like pornography.


	3. Chapter 3

Grantaire did an exceedingly stupid thing then: she kept coming to meetings.

Kept coming even in September, when a pipe in Jeanne’s apartment burst and the group temporarily relocated to Joly and Bossuet’s place, an inconvenient two bus transfers away from Grantaire’s neighborhood.

Kept coming even in December, when the Chicago winter bit at any exposed flesh so sharply that it seemed almost personal.

Kept coming even in June, after rumors spread that an FBI agent had attempted to infiltrate the Boston arm of the DOB. 

Nobody seemed to know how the agent had been spotted, or what had happened after, but the knowledge sucked all the air from the room. Only Enjolras showed no sign of strain. If anything, the story seemed to energize her.

“Don’t you see,” she said, dark eyes flashing, “in a way, this is good news. We would have heard about it had there been mass arrests in Boston. The agent tried, was spotted, and fled.” 

Enjolras waved her wine glass for emphasis. It was mostly full, since she was not much of a drinker, and the liquid sloshed threateningly. What Grantaire wouldn’t have given to be the stem of that glass, clutched tight in Enjolras’s perfect fist. 

“And even more to the point,” Enjolras went on, “if the FBI is taking an interest in what we do, then we must be making an impression. We must simply all take care not to be followed to or from meetings, and thoroughly screen any new members.”

“Is there something we could ask them, to know they’re on the level?” asked Courfeyrac.

“By which you mean, appropriately criminal,” put in Grantaire from the carpet. She’d had enough wine that chairs and sofas had lost their appeal.

“I can’t think it would be that hard to detect an imposter,” Enjolras said, clearly responding to Courfeyrac and not Grantaire. “One has to wonder at the, the research an FBI plant would put into pretending to be a homosexual.”

Grantaire giggled, as out of place in the tense room as a flock of flamingos at a funeral. “We could ask them what they thought of Doris Day in  _ Calamity Jane _ ,” she offered. “Striding around in those buckskin trousers of hers, singing about having a secret love. I swear I saw God in those thighs.” 

She closed her eyes and sang with great solemnity and vibrato,  _ “Once I had a secret love, that lived within the heart of me / All too soon my secret love became impatient to be free…” _

“R,” said Enjolras, “can you please be serious for five seconds?”   
  
“Of course,” said Grantaire, “anyone have a kitchen timer?”

Combeferre was frowning thoughtfully. “It’s not a terrible idea, to have some sort of system for questioning potential additions to the group.”

And so on.

  
  
It was ludicrous. It was folly. It was actively dangerous. And had Grantaire only continued attending meetings for the chance to heckle Enjolras, to shock and needle her into some sort of reaction and shiver under the focus of those eyes, it would have been bad enough. People did stupid things out of attraction all the time.

The truth was worse. The truth was, Grantaire  _ liked  _ these people. She liked Combeferre’s dry wit and Courfeyrac’s carefully constructed cheer, Feuilly’s upright nature and Jeanne’s non sequitur asides, Joly’s merry eccentricities and Bossuet’s good humor. She liked Bahorel’s swagger, and her showmanship in and out of the ring. She even liked Enjolras, and normally Grantaire never liked the people she was attracted to. Enjolras sizzled like a bolt of lightning, but she was unfailingly kind to anyone who gave her reason to be. Combeferre was right; she had a big heart.

Grantaire liked them, and they were doomed, and it was all for nothing anyway. Their goals were  _ ridiculous _ . 

Educate the public? The public that despised them, that labeled them all deviants and predators? 

Cooperate with responsible scholars? Where the Hell were they? Even Grantaire knew the DSM listed homosexuality as a mental illness. More than one of her art school chums had been prescribed a series of strong electrical shocks by a psychiatrist attempting to cure him. 

Propose changes to the penal code? Who were they going to propose those changes  _ to _ , the cops who raided the gay bars seemingly for sport? The judges in their chambers, ruining the life of this homosexual or that homosexual forever and then breaking for lunch?

Grantaire had never met a more doomed cast of characters, and Grantaire liked sad French films.

“I like those movies, too,” said Jeanne, “but this sort of thinking is what stuns people into inaction. Also, you’re welcome to lie on my kitchen floor if you want, but could you move away from the oven?”

Grantaire frowned. She made a mental note to keep better track of what she thought, and what she said out loud. It was probably rude to  _ tell  _ a person she was doomed.

“I want to check on my pies,” Jeanne was saying.

“The pies,” said Grantaire morosely, “are already burning.”

“You missed one,” said Enjolras in the doorway. Grantaire jumped, jogging her head against the black-and-white tile. She had not been aware Enjolras was listening.

“No, they’re all burnt,” Grantaire assured her. “I can smell them.” Jeanne swatted her with a potholder, and she obligingly crawled towards the sink.

“Our aims,” Enjolras said. She was clearly and offensively one-hundred percent sober. “You left out the first one. To educate the variant so that she may better understand herself. You skipped it because you couldn’t think of anything nasty to say about it.”

At that, Grantaire sat up. “I am not  _ nasty _ ,” she said. “Irritating, perhaps. Loud, frequently off-topic—”

“Drunk,” said Enjolras.

With minor scrambling, Grantaire located her empty glass and held it in a toast. “To J. Edgar Hoover,” she said. “May the only plants in here be the cherries currently carbonizing in Jeanne’s most unfortunate pies!”

“Apologize to Jeanne,” said Enjolras firmly.

Grantaire winced. “Sorry, Jeanne.”

“She is right, though,” said Jeanne, throwing the pies, tin and all, directly into the trash. “They’re toast.”

Enjolras pinched the bridge of her nose. “Now apologize to me.”

Grantaire stared up at her, bewildered. “For what?” she said, and Enjolras scoffed.   
  
“Your constant stream of insults?”

“I don’t insult you,” said Grantaire, flush with a little too much drunken candor. “I would  _ never— _ ”

“All of your Diana jokes?”

“Wonder Woman is a hero, so shows what you know,” Grantaire told her.

Enjolras shook her head. “She does nothing but obsess over some guy named Steve.”

“That’s Wonder Woman  _ now _ ,” said Grantaire. “The Comics Code got to her. She used to fight Nazis. She had bullet-proof bracelets and a lasso of truth.”

“A what?”   
  
“A truth-lasso,” Grantaire enunciated. She tried to take a sip from her glass but alas, it was still empty. “She catches bad guys in it and then they can’t lie to her. No games, you see.”

This prompted Enjolras to raise one dark eyebrow. Of course she could raise an eyebrow, of course her self-possession extended to all the muscles of the forehead.

“Would it work on you?” Enjolras said with her usual heart-stopping stare.

Maybe Enjolras was more shaken by the business with the FBI than she let on, Grantaire thought. She had left Grantaire a huge window, one Grantaire could find even while three sheets to the wind. Briefly she wondered if Enjolras had even done it on purpose, but her mind could not make sense of that. Deliberate flirting was as impossible as—well, the aims of the DOB.

Instead, Grantaire regarded Enjolras from under her lashes, easy enough to do from Jeanne’s kitchen floor. The metaphorical distance between them made physical.

“Are you asking whether you can tie me up and have your way with me,” said Grantaire throatily, “because my answer—”

“Must you be this way, all the time, in front of everyone?” Enjolras interjected.

Grantaire grinned. “Why Enjolras, if you’d rather do it in private—” She tossed her hair. “—do feel free to come visit. 1123 North Clark, apartment 1A. The gate squeaks a bit but the landlord is never around to check for late-night suitors with amorous intent—”

Enjolras strode out of the room. Really, the only wonder was that it had taken her so long.

“Would you like a drink of water, R?” said Jeanne. “I’m out of glasses but I’ll give it to you in a soup-pot.”

Grantaire drank some water, and got a lot more of it on her dress, which no doubt served her right. When she was finished, Bahorel offered to walk her home, the meeting having dissolved at some point.

“At least one can be relatively certain I am not a mole for the FBI,” Grantaire told her. “A true imposter would try harder to be useful.”

“Keep your voice down,” said Bahorel, “and honestly, don’t think it hasn’t occurred to me.”

Grantaire was pondering the double negative when the sole of her shoe caught at a crack in the sidewalk and she started to topple.

“Careful,” Bahorel said, pulling her upright.

“Such a gentleman,” said Grantaire. “No, never mind about men. Never mind about them, I say! A  _ gentlewoman _ .” 

“I should put it on my business cards,” Bahorel agreed. “Say, have you given any more thought to sending something into the newsletter?”

Grantaire shook her head, which nearly sent her balance wobbling again. Joly’s borrowed issue of  _ The Ladder _ still sat on her kitchen table, under a growing pile of junk mail. She couldn’t explain why, but somehow the act of opening it felt like crossing a bridge she would never be able to uncross. It was foolish; she had done nearly everything else, but opening a magazine was what had her scared.

She was not afraid it would render her a convert. If Enjolras’s ferocity couldn’t do it, then printed paper held no chance. She couldn’t really explain it. Maybe it was the thought of climbing that ladder to the top and finding nothing there.

“How are  _ you  _ getting home safe?” Grantaire said suddenly.

“Don’t you worry about me,” said Bahorel. “I like the walk. And if someone tries something—” Bahorel grinned, teeth white in the moonlight. “Well. They’re cordially invited to try.”

Grantaire had to laugh at that. Bahorel was good people. “Suppose you came home with me,” she said.

Bahorel stopped walking. “I think that would be a bad idea.”

“I don’t mean for safety,” said Grantaire, in case it was unclear.

“I understand that,” said Bahorel. She began to walk again, the easy strides of the athletic. Grantaire scrambled to keep up.

“Why not?” said Grantaire. “I can be fun.”

“I’m sure you can be,” said Bahorel kindly. “But for one thing, ‘drunk as a skunk’ isn’t my type. For another, I think it would shred the gentle atmosphere of our meetings.”

“How?” Grantaire protested as Bahorel pulled her back from a crosswalk by the collar. A car whizzed by.

“Enjolras—” Bahorel broke off as if regretting having spoken. No doubt she felt a little bad about admitting the warrior princess of Chicago had flaws.

“Is four-square opposed to fun in all its myriad forms,” said Grantaire generously. “I know.”

“Yes,” said Bahorel, “that’s it. Perfect. Right on the money.” Grantaire detected a strange quality to Bahorel’s voice, almost strangled. It was so distracting, Grantaire thoughtlessly took another step into the crosswalk. Bahorel yanked her back by the arm just in time to avoid getting hit by a truck.

“Didn’t your mother teach you to look both ways before crossing the street?” said Bahorel through gritted teeth. “ _ Now _ we can walk. Jesus.”

“She did. I am bucking convention!” Grantaire announced.

“Well, until you learn how to buck several tons of automobile, maybe this is one convention we keep.”

Grantaire could think of no reply to that. There was something she’d wanted to ask, but it had dissipated under the twin rushes of alcohol and adrenaline.

“Here we are!” Bahorel announced a few minutes later, depositing Grantaire on the front step of her apartment. “Take something before you go to bed, doll, you’re a mess.”

Grantaire threw her a salute. She went inside, dutifully swallowed her Quaff-Aid, and collapsed on her bed without so much as taking her shoes off.

  
  


The next morning, she woke up late and groggy. Thankfully, it was a Sunday, so she didn’t have to worry about potentially losing her job. Her boss, long back from his honeymoon, had apparently hired her on purpose—or at least maintained this was true—and had just last week given one of her work sketches an approving nod, so that for the time being, she didn’t have to watch her back as much at work anyway. 

Assuming Hoover didn’t already have a file on her, and all of her friends. Assuming their lives weren’t already over.

Grantaire dragged herself out of bed, brewed a cup of coffee that counted as strong even by her own standards, and put on an old Ma Rainey album. She had been avoiding Ma Rainey lately out of fear it would make her think of Enjolras. She was done fooling herself, though. At this point, even “The Purple People Eater” would’ve made her think of Enjolras.

Last night had a hazy quality to it, but Grantaire distinctly remembered lying caught between the hard tile of Jeanne’s kitchen floor and the hard glare of Enjolras’s disapproval. Terrific. Sensational.

She took a swallow of coffee-paste and began the business of scrambling a few eggs.

“I don't want no man to put no sugar in my tea,” she sang. “I don’t want no man to put no sugar in my tea, some of them are so evil I’m ‘fraid they might poison me.”

Enjolras was wasted in the modern era, she thought. The twenties, that’s where Enjolras belonged, had she been born in Harlem and not the Philippines. The grandeur and bravado of the drag ball. Here, the scope of their struggle was so mammoth and so stupid.

Spatula in hand, she twisted back to face her kitchen table and the pile of advertisements under which still lay that issue of  _ The Ladder _ . A mountain of perfectly coiffed and made up women stared blankly back, promising softer skin and more kissable lips, or a Monday night dinner that would satisfy the whole family. Did Enjolras see these ads, too? Did they make her feel this lonely, this shaken apart? 

If she kept up this reverie, her eggs would burn. She turned back to the stove.

Enjolras risked an arrest for cross-dressing every time she left her apartment in a shirt and trousers, risked more, maybe, for living in white Chicago with those eyes and that complexion. The least Grantaire could do was read a magazine. She switched off the burner and set down the spatula. The eggs lay half-congealed in the pan. Breakfast could wait. Maybe it was time to try climbing.

  
  


For once, Grantaire was early to the meeting, meaning that only Jeanne seemed to be there, flitting around the room to rearrange her taxidermied menagerie in accordance to whims known only to Jeanne.

“I read your magazine,” Grantaire announced by way of greeting as Jeanne rotated a stuffed raccoon at a slight angle.

“Oh?” said Jeanne, “what did you think?”

“Do you want my honest opinion?”

“When have you ever held back?” said Jeanne, still turning the raccoon this way and that.

“I hated it,” said Grantaire. “Despised it. I’ve never seen so much goddamned shit unfortunately committed to paper in all my life.”

“Is R sober?” said Enjolras with dry surprise, emerging from the kitchen with a glass of water.

“Even if I’d been drinking, your  _ Ladder _ would’ve purged the alcohol right out of me,” said Grantaire.

“Perhaps we should keep it around, then,” Enjolras said, pinning Grantaire with a look.

“Ipecac syrup is cheaper,” Grantaire managed, “and goes down easier.”

Enjolras crossed the room and sat on one of Jeanne’s weird antique chairs. “You hated it that much?” she said, almost conversational. That damned coolness, as if Grantaire was absurd for raising her voice or going red in the face or having feelings. Grantaire wanted to throttle her.

“You lied to me,” Grantaire gritted out.

That at least seemed to startle Enjolras. “When?”

“You said I didn’t have anything cutting to say about the first goal of your ridiculous goddamned social club,” said Grantaire. “When in fact that was simply because you didn’t tell me the whole thing, did you? You said it was ‘ _ To educate the variant so that she may better understand herself’ _ —”

“You remember what I said?” Enjolras had gone oddly still.

“Yes, I was tipsy; I wasn’t that indisposed,” snapped Grantaire. 

Enjolras frowned. “But you also said—”

“All manner of shit,” said Grantaire, waving an arm. “That isn’t the point! The point is, you said the goal was self-comprehension, when in actuality it’s—” Grantaire picked up  _ The Ladder _ and brought it down hard on Jeanne’s end table. “Educating people like us ‘to enable her to understand herself and  _ make her adjustment to society _ ,’ and to do that  _ ‘by advocating a mode of behavior and dress acceptable to society. _ ’”

Enjolras said nothing, which might have been concerning had Grantaire been anything but spitting angry.

“There are pages in here,” said Grantaire, “ _ pages _ , about whether or not we’re allowed to wear pants!” She flipped the issue open. “Oh, this is rich. They reprinted editorials from the Examiner and the Chronicle begging us to stay away from mannish attire. ‘ _ When ladies young and old wear sloppy slacks or tight pants on Market St. I wish I had a water pistol and could give each one of them a good squirt. Ladies, please be ladies.’ _ This is your great Cause? This is what we’re all risking everything for?”

“I’ve never seen you in anything but dresses or skirts,” said Enjolras.

Grantaire took a shaky breath. “Believe it or not, I have room in my heart to care about something beyond my own miserable skin.” Their eyes connected. Grantaire’s face felt hot. She wished she could remember how it felt to only want to lie on the floor and make jokes.

“Oh,” said Enjolras, quietly, “so this is on my behalf, then?” Grantaire bit her lip. Enjolras continued, “You know, if it was up to me, I’d rather see you spend a moment of your time  _ listening  _ at meetings rather than all fired up because of some words in a publication put together by women who are braver than you’ll ever be, working harder than you’ll ever work, actually trying to change something. Did you read the essay they printed after it? About how we all must broaden our notion of the feminine, and embrace all our sisters or we’ll be nothing?”

“I did,” Grantaire said, “and who cares? They still printed the other shit. They still gave it a space, gave everyone who thinks that way more words in their quiver the next time it comes up. They wouldn’t have included all of that damned nonsense about how ladies must look like ladies if they didn’t think it made a point. They see you, and everyone like you, as an embarrassment, as the thing that’s holding us back, without stopping to think that maybe the real reason we’re held back is because we’re  _ obsessed  _ with begging for _ table scraps _ from a world that will never see us as anything but sick and broken.”

“First we were too radical for you, and now we’re not radical enough,” said Enjolras. “You really—”

“Who is  _ we _ ?” Grantaire broke in. “You may be a happy little family in Chicago, but the other branches—the people who make this magazine  _ hate  _ you. They hate you as much as anyone else in the rest of the country hates you. They’re happy to let you recruit and organize and work your fingers to the bone, but the moment you’re inconvenient to them, all they want is for you to put on a dress and disappear.”

Enjolras swallowed. Grantaire watched that fine throat work and for once her feelings of want were completely overshadowed by a kind of frantic despair.

“Did you look at all the reader letters?” said Enjolras. “All of the people writing in to say thank you in the most emphatic possible terms? The Daughters and  _ The Ladder _ are doing something. They’re helping people. We are drowning, we are all drowning, and there is exactly one lifeboat. We don’t get to decide that’s not good enough, because there is nothing else. They’re saving lives. What are  _ you  _ doing, R, besides pouring drinks?”

“You’re turning personal because you agree with me,” Grantaire said fiercely. “You agree, and you hate it.”

“Do not tell me what it is I feel,” said Enjolras.

“I may be a mess, but at least I’m forthright about it,” said Grantaire, standing and making to grab her purse.

“Oh, do you think you’re original?” sneered Enjolras. Grantaire froze. Enjolras leaned closer. “Do you think it has never occurred to another variant to laugh at her own pain, and get drunk every time she feels something, and openly despise herself like she’s daring everyone else to join in? You come in here judging others, but you’re the outside world’s greatest invention: the homosexual who destroys herself, and saves society the trouble of lifting a finger.”

Grantaire stared. Her jaw worked.

There was a slight cough from behind her. Grantaire turned to see the rest of the Chicago chapter of the DOB, open-mouthed.

“Enjolras,” said Combeferre after a long pause, “I think you owe R an apology.”

Not one molecule of Grantaire was interested in hearing Enjolras attempt to fake contrition for words that were so clearly, precisely meant.

“Leave it,” said Grantaire, finally locating her purse at last, “I just remembered I have a pressing appointment anywhere else.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The detail about finding a mole in Boston is pure invention. That said, the FBI was interested in the DOB in the 1950s, at least to the point of having an agent attend and report on a 1959 meeting. In 1984, the FBI declassified their files on the DOB, which included membership lists from DOB chapters in San Francisco, Los Angeles, and Boston, but these were from the 1970s. I have no idea how extensive the FBI’s infiltration was when the story takes place, but the characters are right to be very shaken at the possibility.
> 
> Calamity Jane came out in 1953. It has some unintentionally amazing lesbian undertones. [Here](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H8P_p7dB2dw) is “Secret Love,” which isn’t even the most undertone-y scene. That award goes to [“A Woman’s Touch,”](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b0W3Ih38QEg&t=34s) which leans so far into gender stereotypes that it topples right into a kind of maniacally cheerful homoeroticism.
> 
> Shock treatment, as has already been mentioned, was seen as a way to "cure" homosexuality. 
> 
> The Comics Code Authority did indeed come for Wonder Woman, and she spent the 1950s at home, having romantic adventures and working as an advice columnist. Y’know, superhero stuff.
> 
> Grantaire’s address puts her in the Near North neighborhood of Chicago, which was a gay enclave in the 1940s and 1950s.
> 
> Quaff-Aid was marketed as a hangover prevention in the 1950s. It was actually just brewer’s yeast. Yeah, I don’t know either. At least it wasn’t anything dangerous.
> 
> “The Purple People Eater” debuted in May 1958. Did I tweak the entire timeline of this story just for this one half-joke? Who would do that, I ask you.
> 
> Ma Rainey was one of several fairly openly queer Black woman in the 1920s blues and jazz scene. She sang about wearing suits and getting into lovers’ spats with women, among other things. 
> 
> Anyone who has read the Wikipedia article for _The Ladder_ knows where I got those quotes from. I really did try to look up more actual text from issues in the 1950s but the only online collection of scans I could find started in 1960, and I felt very leery about just making stuff up.


	4. Chapter 4

On Monday, Combeferre attempted to take lunch with Grantaire. Grantaire pretended to have an urgent work deadline. On Tuesday, Combeferre extended the invitation again, and Grantaire used the same excuse. On Wednesday, Grantaire claimed she wasn’t feeling well. On Thursday, Combeferre stopped trying.

The day of the meeting came. The day of the meeting passed. Grantaire stayed home.

The worst part was that with Enjolras’s words still reverberating in her ears, drinking wasn’t fun anymore. Then Grantaire tried to think of the last time drinking had really been fun, and drew a blank, which was also probably concerning. She could do with cutting back, she figured.

On Sunday, Grantaire woke up late again, took a long shower, and put on her worst bathrobe, the one she painted in. It was old and faded and riddled with dark smudges where she had wiped her brushes before rinsing them. A bad habit, but on the overall list of Grantaire’s bad habits, hardly worth writing home about. She braided her wet hair and set about locating her easel, at the back of her closet.

It had been a while since Grantaire had painted. At work, obviously, she stuck to pen and ink. She had missed colors, she realized. She put on a record and started unpacking her paints.

Grantaire painted all day, stopping only for a sandwich or two. She filled two canvases, weird abstract things she knew she’d never be able to sell, but the sheer joy of making something new smoothed out that agitation. She would frame them somehow and nail them on her own walls, damn the apartment deposit.

Grantaire was maybe a quarter of the way through her third canvas, and halfway through Bessie Smith’s “I Ain’t Got Nobody” when she became aware of a knocking at the door. She hoped it wasn’t the landlord coming to complain about the music. It was, she saw, peeking through the curtains, actually quite late.

Only by the time she reached the door did she stop to consider it might be rude to greet her landlord in nothing but a threadbare, paint-spattered bathrobe, but by then it was too late. Grantaire whisked open the door, preparing herself for a tongue-lashing.

Enjolras stood on the front step, breathing hard.

“What,” said Grantaire.

“Let me in,” panted Enjolras.

“It’s the middle of the night,” said Grantaire blankly.

Enjolras gave a wild-eyed look and Grantaire stepped aside, closing the door behind her.

“If you’re here to say you’re sorry,” Grantaire started.

“I’m not,” said Enjolras.

“Oh,” said Grantaire. There was a pause. Grantaire remembered again about the bathrobe and felt even sillier. “How did you even find me?”

For a moment, Enjolras looked immeasurably tired. “You gave me your address,” she said.

“I don’t think I did that,” said Grantaire with a frown.

“You were drunk,” said Enjolras flatly, and that did make a degree of sense.

“Oh,” said Grantaire again. “Why are you here?”  
  
“There was a raid tonight,” Enjolras said in an undertone, “at the Musain.”

“What were you doing there?” Grantaire asked, before her brain could catch up with her mouth and remind her forcefully that it was none of Grantaire’s damn business where Enjolras went, that it never had been and never would be.

“Courfeyrac and I were trying to get word out about—” Enjolras started.

Grantaire felt something cold weigh heavily in her stomach. “My God, Courfeyrac! Is she okay?”

“She is.” Enjolras let out a long breath. “She got away.” She stepped further into the room. “I should probably tell you,” she added, “that I punched a cop.”  
  
“You punched a _what?_ ”

“So that Courfeyrac could get away,” Enjolras said in a very reasonable tone of voice. “I think I lost him down the alley but I’m not certain. Can I use your telephone? I need to make a few calls.” 

Grantaire nodded. The record had stopped by then—Grantaire wasn’t sure when—and she heard, very clearly, a series of brisk knocks at the door.

Damn.

They stared at each other.

With a tilt of her head, Grantaire indicated that Enjolras should duck into the bedroom, at the back of the apartment. Then she took a deep breath and answered the door.

“Good evening, ma’am, sorry to bother you,” said the policeman. His uniform was impeccable but a faint trail of blood still trickled from one nostril.

“Officer,” said Grantaire, mouth dry.

“There was an altercation a few blocks from here, involving some dangerous criminals,” he said. “One of them unfortunately got away, and I’d like to know if you’ve seen or heard anything.”

Grantaire pretended to look thoughtful. “Nothing tonight, sir.”

“Think I’ll come inside and have a look around,” said the policeman. “I thought I heard voices.”

“Oh!” Grantaire gave a laugh, heart thudding in her chest. “That was me. I talk to myself sometimes. Terribly embarrassing, but it gets so awfully lonely in the city, you know?” Let him think her a batty old maid, she thought. It wasn’t even that far from the truth.

He narrowed his eyes. “I heard two voices,” he said.

Grantaire widened hers. “Well, yes. I talk to myself, and then I answer. There’s nothing for it, sadly. This modern way of living has a few lumps in it along the way, let me tell you.”

The policeman attempted to peer around Grantaire. “I’m coming in,” he said.

“Of course,” said Grantaire. God, she hoped Enjolras had shut the bedroom door behind her, but Grantaire was too nervous to check. Would glancing back into the apartment give everything away? “Thank you for your service,” she chattered as she stepped aside. “I feel much safer knowing the boys in blue are out there to protect the little people like us, especially with crooks running about in this very neighborhood, can you imagine!”

“Hm,” said the policeman, looking around the room. Grantaire watched his back and got a terrible idea.

“In fact,” she said slowly, “I think I owe you a drink.”

The policeman turned back to face her. “Nonsense,” he snapped.

“Oh no, you must stay!” said Grantaire. She began rooting around in her liquor cabinet. “I make a _swell_ Martini and it would be so lovely to have a man around the place for a bit, especially with those terrible criminals on the loose!” She resurfaced holding a bottle of gin and a bottle of vermouth.

The policeman shuffled his feet, looking distinctly uncomfortable. “That’s really not—”

“As a thank you for your service,” Grantaire purred. She set the gin and the vermouth on the sideboard and give him a slow once-over with her eyes. “And for wearing the uniform so well,” she added. 

“Uh,” said the policeman.

Grantaire put a hand to her collarbone, tugging down the robe to reveal what little cleavage she had. “Oh please do stay,” she said, simpering. “It would be my pleasure.”

“I really should be going, ma’am,” he said, pushing past her.

“But you just said there are awful people lurking out there!” Grantaire protested. “How’s a girl on her own supposed to feel safe—”

“Lock your doors and windows,” he called, beating a hasty retreat.

Grantaire locked the front door behind him, leaned back on it, and took a deep breath. The bedroom door was closed.

She walked to the record player and put on the first album she grabbed. Big Mama Thornton’s “Hound Dog.” Fine. She listened for a moment, shaking her shoulders to the bassline. Elvis Presley deserved to be drawn and quartered for all his musical crimes. It was a familiar thought, worn at the edges. Grantaire grasped at it. When she judged that she had waited long enough, she knocked lightly on the bedroom door.

“Coast’s clear,” said Grantaire.

Immediately, the door opened and Enjolras stuck her head out. “You offered him a drink and he left?” she said, disbelieving. “How did that work?”

“I didn’t offer him a drink,” said Grantaire. “I offered him—” she waggled her eyebrows, “a _drink_.”

Enjolras strode into the room. Grantaire stepped back to give her space. “That was stupid. What if he’d said yes?” Enjolras demanded.

“He wasn’t going to,” said Grantaire with a shrug.

“How can you be certain?” said Enjolras.

Grantaire laughed. “I keep forgetting what the world must be like for beautiful people.”

“That doesn’t answer my question,” Enjolras said. “How—”

“Because a man who keeps his uniform that starched and polished doesn’t pause his shift to indulge,” said Grantaire. “Because a man who has worked so hard to be in charge of everybody doesn’t actually like when a girl has the temerity to make a pass at him. Because of the dimensions of my face and body, take your pick.” She felt very tired all of a sudden, and a little shaky. 

The gin and vermouth were still on the sideboard. “Want a drink?” said Grantaire, automatic, and Enjolras froze. It was nearly comical.

Nearly.

Grantaire sighed. “Not a _drink_ ,” she said, rubbing at her face. “A drink, plain and simple, good Diana. I can mix it while you make your telephone calls. The telephone is—”   
  
“In the bedroom,” said Enjolras. “I know. I saw. And no, I would not like a drink.”   
  
Of course. Grantaire wasn’t sure what had made her ask. She hadn’t given any real thought to the two of them toasting Enjolras’s daring escape, clinking glasses together, knees brushing under Grantaire’s tiny kitchen table.

Enjolras disappeared into the bedroom. Grantaire considered fixing herself a Martini, but she didn’t want the taste of it in her mouth. Anyway, it was wine she liked and she was out. For want of anything better to do, she put away the liquor and picked up her paintbrush again.

“R,” someone was saying from a great distance. “R!”

“Hm?” Grantaire dragged her eyes away from the canvas. Enjolras was still standing there in her apartment, for some reason. 

“What are you painting?” said Enjolras politely. Grantaire blinked, unsure what planet she had landed on.

Grantaire was painting, or attempting to paint, the way she felt at meetings: the bright, aching pull of Enjolras’s hope and determination, boxed in by the shadowy dread that always lurked at the edges of Grantaire’s mind. 

“Some abstract garbage,” Grantaire mumbled, and Enjolras thankfully seemed to accept this.

“Do you mind if I stay here tonight?” said Enjolras.

It was likely too late at this point to call a cab or take the L. Grantaire realized she had no idea where Enjolras lived. Far enough away to be stuck with Grantaire.

“Of course,” said Grantaire without turning around. “I’ve slept on the sofa before, I can do it again.”

“I couldn’t put you out like that.” Enjolras sounded as though this hadn’t occurred to her until just now.

“I don’t see what else there is for it,” said Grantaire, tidying up the kitchen. “I’m sure you saw when you were in there, it’s only a double, and I’m not making you sleep on the sofa after the night you’ve had.”

“I think we’d both fit,” said Enjolras, argumentative to the end. “You’re not large.”

Grantaire nearly dropped the sponge. “You’d be trying it at your own risk,” she said eventually. “I’ve been told I’m a cuddler.”

Enjolras made no reply.

“Who were you calling?” said Grantaire as she scrubbed some forks, mostly to have something to say.

“A few people,” said Enjolras. “Combeferre, Courfeyrac’s husband—”

“Does Courfeyrac’s husband know…?” said Grantaire.

Enjolras sighed. “It’s complicated. He knows she’s home safe. She called a cab.”

It was hard to parse Enjolras’s tone without looking at her. Grantaire reluctantly set the forks in the sink and turned around. 

“That’s good,” Grantaire said uncertainly.

“Yes,” said Enjolras, looking truly relieved, Grantaire thought. “And our lawyer, I called her, too.”

This took a moment to sink in. “We have a lawyer?”

“The San Francisco branch does, and it’s not as late there,” Enjolras replied. “That’s why Courfeyrac and I were at the Musain. We have a contact at the police department, a secretary, who told us there might be a raid tonight, and so we were—”

“Risking yourself and Courfeyrac, to tell them to go home?” Grantaire interjected. “Christ, Enjolras—”

“Telling them their rights,” said Enjolras. “Giving them the lawyer’s number to call if they did get arrested on this night or some other.”  
  
“What rights?” said Grantaire bitterly, leaning against the sink.

Enjolras gave her a long look. “You know it’s not illegal to be a homosexual, right?”

Grantaire faltered. “But—it must be—”

“It’s illegal to perform homosexual acts,” said Enjolras, slowly circling the room, “or to put ‘lewd material’ through the post. It might be illegal to organize, the way that we do. But the state of being is not technically against the law. When people are arrested at a gay bar, usually the crime they’re charged with is ‘common prostitution.’ If they plead not guilty, if they ask for a jury trial, it’s likely the case will be dismissed. But most people panic, because they’ve been taught to panic, because they’ve been taught this is the worst thing they could ever be and on some level, they believe it.”

Grantaire swallowed. “It’s not their fault—”

“I’m not saying it’s their fault,” said Enjolras. “I’m saying they’d be a lot better off if there was somewhere they could go to learn their rights, to be told they don’t need to hate such a fundamental part of themselves.”

“And to be taught to feel ashamed if they want to wear blue jeans,” said Grantaire.

Enjolras’s shoulders drooped almost imperceptibly. “You were right about that,” she said. “I do hate it.” Her circuit of the room had brought her to the window. With the shades drawn, only the slightest glow from a street lamp illuminated her face. “I just don’t see another way forward. It’s a bargain I make with myself every day, and a dirty one. But I see the good the Daughters are doing, the lives they’re saving and connecting, and it’s beautiful.” She turned her head to look at Grantaire. The light from outside was nothing compared to the light from within. “It really is.”

“I suppose,” said Grantaire, drying her hands.

“Courfeyrac’s former student came to yesterday’s meeting,” Enjolras continued. “She's been writing steadily to Courfeyrac, and in her last letter, she confessed to having feelings for another female student, so Courfeyrac suggested she join us. Bright girl. A little naive, but promising. Overjoyed to find us.”

Grantaire nodded slowly.

“If she hadn’t met Courfeyrac—” said Enjolras. 

“I know,” said Grantaire.

“I wish I could make you see how beautiful it is,” Enjolras said. “Even one person learning that they’re not sick or alone. Knowing she might have a chance to tell others. Imagine we lived in a world where homosexuality, female homosexuality in particular, wasn’t some terrible secret we had to learn from pulp novels or tragedies or the whispers of friends.”

“Blues music,” Grantaire added, before she could shut her mouth.

Enjolras paused. “Really?” she said. “That’s how you—”

“It is.” Grantaire nodded towards her record collection.

“How,” said Enjolras.

It was so strange, to simply have a normal conversation with her, that Grantaire barely knew how to reply.

“I knew a boy who liked jazz,” she said.

“Sorry to hear it,” said Enjolras gravely.

It took Grantaire a moment to realize Enjolras was making a joke. She laughed. “No, no,” said Grantaire. “Or well, yes, sort of, but. He used to lend me his race records, he had a little of everything, and one day I listened to this.” Grantaire brushed a finger down the edge of her own tattered copy of “Prove It On Me.”

“I’ve never heard of it,” said Enjolras, with what sounded like real curiosity. 

What the Hell. Grantaire pulled the album from the sleeve and placed it on the turntable. “Would you like to?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As noted earlier, gay and lesbian bars were always under threat of being raided, and the police frequently gave lists of names to employers or newspapers.
> 
> Bessie Smith was called The Empress of Blues. [Her version of “I Ain’t Got Nobody”](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fi_vKZe5NWk) came out in 1926.
> 
> Big Mama Thornton was the first to record “Hound Dog,” released in 1953. It was meant as an expression of Black female independence, telling off a sleazy and untrustworthy guy. It sold half a million copies and spent 14 weeks in the R&B charts. Then Elvis Presley recorded his cover in 1956, which sold 10 million copies and kind of made a hash of the lyrics. [The Big Mama Thornton version](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jr9q485COk0) is definitely worth a listen, for what it’s worth.
> 
> The bit about it not being illegal to be queer in and of itself, and about how you could actually maybe get off the hook if you asked for a jury trial I got from [an unreleased documentary made in 1988](http://herstories.prattinfoschool.nyc/omeka/exhibits/show/daughters-of-bilitis-video-pro/an-unreleased-documentary), featuring interviews with prominent members of the D.O.B.
> 
> “Race records” was the term for records made by and for Black people from the 1920s to the 1940s. According to Wikipedia, this wasn’t seen as a derogatory term at the time; “race man” or “race woman” was a term used by the Black press to reference people who were proud and supportive of Black culture.


	5. Chapter 5

Grantaire set the needle on the record. The familiar horns started up, and Enjolras took a seat cross-legged on the couch. Belatedly, Grantaire realized it would be more than a little strange to simply stand there and watch Enjolras listen to the song. The kitchen was—thankfully—still a mess, and Grantaire got to work scrubbing her day-old dishes.

_ “When out last night, had a bad big fight,” _ sang Ma Rainey behind her,   
_ Everything seemed to go on wrong  
_ _ I looked up, to my surprise  
_ _ The gal I was with was gone” _

“Huh,” said Enjolras.

“Hang on,” said Grantaire over her shoulder, “it gets better.” She rinsed a dish and set it gingerly on the counter, so as not to make too much noise.

_ “Where she went, I don't know  
_ _ I’m meant to follow everywhere she goes;  
_ _ Folks say I'm crooked. I didn't know where she took it  
_ _ I want the whole world to know.” _

Another dish. Grantaire set it down with the care of someone handling an atomic bomb and hummed along with the next bit:

_ “They say I do it, ain't nobody caught me  
_ _ Sure got to prove it on me” _

_ “Went out last night with a crowd of my friends,  
_ _ They must've been women, 'cause I don't like no men” _

Grantaire couldn’t help it; she needed to see Enjolras’s reaction. When she turned, a sudsy coffee mug still in one hand, Enjolras was listening intently, head tilted to the side.

_ “It's true I wear a collar and a tie,  
_ _ Makes the wind blow all the while  
_ _ Don't you say I do it, ain't nobody caught me  
_ _ You sure got to prove it on me.” _

“When was this written?” said Enjolras.

“‘28,” said Grantaire. “They don’t write ‘em like they used to.”

_ “I went out last night with a crowd of my friends,” _ Ma Rainey was singing,  
_ “It must've been women, 'cause I don't like no men.” _

“Wait for it,” said Grantaire, holding up a finger.

_ “Wear my clothes just like a fan  
_ _ Talk to the gals just like any old man  
_ _ Cause they say I do it, ain't nobody caught me  
_ _ Sure got to prove it on me.” _

“1928, are you sure?” said Enjolras when the song ended.

“I am,” said Grantaire, drying her hands on a dishtowel and stepping over to place the record reverently back in its sleeve. “She wasn’t even the only one. Bessie Smith, Gladys Bentley, no doubt a few others that didn’t make it into history.”

Enjolras looked up at her. “I’ve heard of Bessie Smith,” she said, sounding almost young. “Was she really—?”

“ _ When you see two women walking hand in hand, _ ” Grantaire sang quietly,  _ “just look ‘em over and try to understand: They’ll go to those parties—have the lights down low—only those parties where women can go.”  _

Enjolras’s mouth was hanging slightly open; Grantaire shook her head. “As far as I can tell, there used to be—not safety, of course, but maybe a little anonymity,” said Grantaire. “People could take a step in the city without Johnny Law breathing down your neck. And then the Depression came, and everyone got mean again.” She sighed. “I swear, you were born in the wrong decade, Diana.”

This seemed to snap Enjolras out of whatever trance she was in. “Not at all,” she said. “I was born exactly when and where I needed to be. What you say about nobody breathing down your neck, that’s how it already is back in the Philippines. That freedom not some bygone notion. It could be that way again here, too. I know you don’t believe me, but things are going to get better.”

The sight of Enjolras peering up at Grantaire was too weird. Grantaire considered the floor, remembered again she was only wearing a bathrobe, cursed herself roundly for her Bohemian lifestyle, and took a very cautious seat next to Enjolras on the sofa.

“No,” said Grantaire heavily, “I believe you.”

“You don’t act as if you do,” said Enjolras.

“Sure,” said Grantaire. “I believe things will be better again, and then worse. And then better. And then probably much worse. Fifteen years ago, women had jobs and we had money of our own and we had—baseball. Were you around for that?”

“No,” said Enjolras. “We came over in ‘46.”

“Well, we had actual professional baseball leagues,” said Grantaire. “And then the men came home from the war, and they said,  _ ‘Gosh, thanks for keeping all those opportunities and freedoms warm, we’ll just be taking those back now, don’t you worry your pretty little heads about them!’ _ And the women of America let them. We shut down the baseball teams and we gave back the jobs, and now here we are. It’s a tide, don’t you see? The water goes in and out a little, so that half the time there’s an illusion of progress, but nothing ever really changes. It can’t. We always get just enough hope to be dashed against the rocks again.”

“Nonsense,” said Enjolras firmly. “Absolute nonsense. It’s not a tide, it’s not some—natural process we have to stand back and watch happen. The motions of history are made of people, groups of people, and we always have the option of finding those people and joining them. It’s not a tide, it’s a, a river that can be dammed.”

Grantaire smiled slightly. “Your metaphor doesn’t hold water,” she said.

“It does, dam it,” said Enjolras, and Grantaire laughed, unbidden. Enjolras smiled at her then. A small smile, but a real one. Grantaire registered the miles of distance between their souls and the inches of distance between their bodies on the couch—when had Grantaire moved closer?—and knew it was a matter of seconds before she destroyed their butterfly-fragile peace in some awful way. Enjolras was too close, and too warm, and too human; Grantaire almost felt that if she reached out and touched Enjolras, Enjolras might not recoil. Might smile again, at her,  _ for  _ her. Might—

Grantaire leapt off the couch. “Would you like some hot cocoa?”

Enjolras furrowed her brow.

“I’m not mocking you,” said Grantaire. “If I was mocking you, I’d be offering you warm milk. I only thought, it’s probably been a trying day for you, and you already turned down my Martini—”

“OK,” said Enjolras.

Grantaire got down a pot and filled it with one mug’s worth of water. After a pause, she added another mugfull for herself as well and put the pot on the stove.

“Mmm, nothing like boiling hot chocolate on a warm June night,” said Grantaire into the sudden oppressive quiet.

“You don’t have to,” said Enjolras, “if it’s any trouble.”

“Of course I do,” said Grantaire, bending to retrieve the hot cocoa mix and struggling to keep her voice light. “You punched a cop. That deserves a drink of some kind.”

Another long pause. Apparently their moment of friendliness had evaporated on its own.

Grantaire ripped open two packets and dumped them into the pot. She already regretted making two servings. It was too much. Everything she did was too much, and yet Enjolras still seemed not to pick up on the wild, feral flailings of Grantaire’s heart. Maybe she simply didn’t want to.

The wooden spoons were in a little vase on the counter. Grantaire picked one up and began to stir the mixture, which looked gritty and unappetizing. The clank of spoon hitting the side of the pot was almost unbearably loud.

“Tell me,” said Grantaire, still stirring. “How does it happen?”   
  
“What?” said Enjolras somewhere behind her.

“Your version of the future. How do we change the course of the river?”

“Do you really want to know?”

“Unless you have a better idea for filling the silence,” said Grantaire. “I suppose we could play ‘I spy’ but—”

“You won’t believe me,” Enjolras said, and Grantaire realized then how badly she needed Enjolras to disagree with her, how comforting it was to come up again and again against the granite of Enjolras’s convictions. 

“Probably not. But I’ll wish I could,” she added, wistful. Too much again. Always too much. Grantaire stirred the pot on the stove with some violence.

Enjolras said nothing for a long while. It was long enough that Grantaire began to wonder if she’d finally betrayed herself beyond any help, if Enjolras  _ knew,  _ and then Enjolras said, quite calmly, “It starts with the doctors. In a way, it already has. Have you read Kinsey?”

Grantaire shook her head, and then, in case Enjolras wasn’t looking said, “No.”

“Well, Dr. Kinsey surveyed thousands and thousands of people, and found that about ten percent of men and one to three percent of women were exclusively homosexual, with plenty more at a kind of midway point.”

Grantaire stopped stirring. “That high?”

“That high,” confirmed Enjolras. “Do you see why we work so hard to find people? There are so many more of us than we even know, and if society truly had to reckon with the fact that we could be your mailman or your librarian or your cousin—”

“They might grow to accept us more,” Grantaire filled in. “Or they might feel like they’re trapped in  _ Invasion of the Body Snatchers _ and hate us even more.”

“At least we’d be harder to ignore,” said Enjolras. “At least life might be a little less lonely.”

The cocoa was forming definite clumps again. Grantaire beat at them with her spoon.

“It goes beyond that,” Enjolras continued. “The science of it, I mean. You should hear Combeferre despair over the methodologies that have been used so far to trace the cause and characteristics of homosexuality. It’s absurd. They’re not using a scientific approach. The moment someone decides to follow proper procedure, they’ll see.” “See what?” said Grantaire.

“That there’s nothing wrong with us,” said Enjolras. Grantaire didn’t have to see her to know her eyes were shining. Grantaire could picture it clearly in her furtive, shame-sodden mind.

_ Speak for yourself, _ thought Grantaire.

“That the only thing that plagues us is the self-hatred they beat into us,” said Enjolras. “To be a woman in the modern age is already to be taught to apologize for our every thought and action. To be a woman who loves women—it’s amazing that any of us have learned to stand on our own.”

“And then what?” said Grantaire around a lump in her throat. “After the headshrinkers have decreed there’s nothing medically wrong with us, do you think that teaspoon of water will put out the fires of their hatred?”

“No,” said Enjolras. “Not at first. But bit by bit, the more we come out, the more others will be forced to see we aren’t the predators they’ve been trained to recognize. I doubt they’ll mobilize, but they might at least stand aside as we do.”

Grantaire took the cocoa off the heat and turned the burner off. There was an ache in her chest from how badly she wanted to accept Enjolras’s deranged truths as her own. She carefully poured the contents of the pot into two mugs. It was as smooth as it was going to be. 

“I think the law will be the last to change,” Enjolras was saying. “Medicine first, then public opinion will start to shift. Laws move slowly. Courts move slowly, but when they do move, when we are truly equal in the eyes of the law—

“And when the God-fearing men who still despise us notice what rights we’ve been given and finally take them all away,” said Grantaire hoarsely. “What then?”

“Then we’ll fight harder for those rights than we’ve ever fought before,” said Enjolras, voice low. “Because by then, by  _ then _ , we’ll know we deserve them.”

Any minute now, Grantaire was going to turn around and coolly hand Enjolras her mug. Any minute, Grantaire would get her face and her breathing under control. She dabbed at the corners of her eyes and braced her hands on the counter. Any minute now. 

Any minute.

A hand landed on her shoulder. Enjolras was standing right behind her.

“I’ve upset you,” said Enjolras.

Grantaire shook her head. She didn’t trust herself to speak.

“I don’t think it will be overnight,” said Enjolras. She gave Grantaire’s shoulder a tentative squeeze. “I think it will take a very long time. I don’t think we’ll be able to marry until the nineties—”

Grantaire choked out a laugh. She could see herself destroying the mood before she actually found the words to do it.

“Us, marry?” she said, and her expression was likely not back to normal yet, but Enjolras could still only see the set of her shoulders and the back of her head. “Why Diana, I had no idea you cared.”

Enjolras let her hand drop away.

“You see,” said Enjolras levelly. “We’d gone so long without you saying something cruel, I thought maybe you’d forgotten how.”

“I’m not cruel,” said Grantaire, blinking hard at the pair of mugs on the kitchen counter. “I’m not cruel and I’m not nasty, either.”

“You can’t open your mouth without making a mockery—” Enjolras started.

“Of you?” said Grantaire. She thought her face was probably passable by now. She turned around. “That’s different. It’s like a dung beetle mocking the sun. It doesn’t do any injury to the sun. Here, take your cocoa.”

Enjolras accepted the hot chocolate as if she had never seen a mug before, as if Grantaire had handed her a fistful of moon dust.

“You’re saying I don’t have feelings,” said Enjolras.

“I’m saying that your feelings are not tied to anything I do,” said Grantaire lightly.

“Because you’re a dung beetle.”

Grantaire nodded with as much dignity as she could, given the circumstances.

“Why do you do that,” Enjolras said suddenly.

“Do what?” said Grantaire.

“Say you’re ugly, call yourself a  _ bug _ , throw yourself into a painting and then describe that painting as garbage—” Enjolras broke off with a frustrated sound. “It puts others in the awkward position of having to reassure you.”

“How do you know if I _ throw myself into a painting _ ,” said Grantaire. “You don’t know anything about art.”

“It was obvious from the way you made the—the brush strokes,” said Enjolras.

Grantaire goggled at her. “How long did you watch me paint?”

“Long enough to see you putting care into it,” said Enjolras crisply, and Grantaire felt very caught out until she remembered that it was abstract and Enjolras wouldn’t actually be able to see herself in the canvas.

“You know, you have the option of just agreeing with me,” said Grantaire. “I  _ am  _ ugly.”

Enjolras frowned. “If I say you’re not ugly, you’ll just say something—ridiculous."

“Then say I’m ugly,” said Grantaire. “Trust me, people have been kind enough to point this out. It is not mysterious to me.” She paused. “Say I’m ugly, or I’ll take away your cocoa.”

Enjolras took a long sip. “No.”

Never one to disappoint, Grantaire batted her eyelashes. “Aw, are you calling me pretty? Such a charmer—”

“It doesn’t particularly matter one way another, does it?” said Enjolras. “There’s more important things.” Somehow, the  _ I don’t care  _ hurt even more than  _ you’re ugly _ . That it was Grantaire’s own fault didn’t especially help matters.

“Of course noble Diana is above such puny mortal pursuits as using one’s eyeballs,” said Grantaire, a hand on her chest. “Wise Diana, great Diana, deep and brainy Diana—”

“Will you quit it with the Wonder Woman nonsense,” broke in Enjolras.

“No no,” said Grantaire. “We’re back to Diana of the ancient Roman tradition. Even Wonder Woman doesn’t think she can cure society of all its prejudices. Only a goddess could stare down the barrel of the world’s intolerance and think—”

“Stop that,” said Enjolras, cheeks flushing in anger. “Christ, I wish I did have a truth-rope—”

“A lasso of truth,” said Grantaire automatically. “Brush up on your literature once in a while—”

“How would you even finish a conversation if you couldn’t lie,” said Enjolras.

“I don’t lie,” said Grantaire. Always defending her character in one way or another against Enjolras’s onslaught.

Enjolras set her mug on the side table. “All your mock-supplication,” she spat. She opened her eyes wide. “ _ ‘Oh great goddess, I’d do anything for you—’ _ ”

Grantaire did not remember saying that, but it didn’t mean she hadn’t. Wine was such a traitor.

“You won’t even stop calling me Diana,” said Enjolras. “And I’ve asked you—”

“Fine,” said Grantaire, surprising even herself. “Fine. I’ll stop if it—”  _ hurts you _ was absurd. “If it really bothers you.”

“Really?” said Enjolras.

Not for a million dollars could Grantaire meet her eyes. She stared at the carpet instead.

“You may have to remind me,” said Grantaire. “But I’ll try.”

“Well,” said Enjolras, seemingly at a near loss for words. “Thank you.”

Grantaire swallowed, trying not to feel anything in particular, trying not to register the odd sensation behind her breastbone, a feeling of rightness that reverberated like a struck tuning fork. She failed.

It was no doubt unwise to try to chase that feeling, but Grantaire was only one person. “Anything else you want, Enjolras?” she managed. Without an obvious joke to cover for her, she felt awfully bare.

Enjolras gave her an unreadable look. “Everyone wants something. That’s part of the human condition.”

Grantaire decided to give it one more try. Just one, then she would let it drop.

“Suppose we played a game,” Grantaire heard herself say. “Three rounds of dare. Dare me to do something, and I’ll do it.”

Enjolras pinched the bridge of her nose. “That’s not a game, that’s just blind obedience.”

Grantaire mulled this over. “I could have a veto,” she said. “But if I decline, that’s it, you lose your turn. What do you say?”

“Why this?” said Enjolras.

“For the novelty, if nothing else,” said Grantaire. 

She wasn’t sure why her heart was beating the way that it was. The moment seemed to stretch for a very long time, and then Enjolras nodded, just once.

“So!” said Grantaire, when no dares were forthcoming. “First you—”

“I understand the rules,” said Enjolras. “It’s not complicated.”

Grantaire nodded.

“First dare,” Enjolras said, and Grantaire straightened. “Drink your cocoa.”

Grantaire tried not to be put out. She had wanted—she had hoped—what exactly had she been after? She had a sudden horrible feeling there was something distinctly unwholesome at the heart of her desire to do what Enjolras said. 

Had she honestly thought on any level that Enjolras might ask her to do something truly shocking? This was the trouble of talking to Enjolras as if they were normal people. It cast shadows, created illusions, gave Grantaire the fleeting sense there was anything she had that Enjolras might want.

The cocoa was too sweet. Grantaire took a long swallow anyway, licking her lips because the thought of dealing with Enjolras while wearing a chocolate mustache was too much to bear.

“You sure wasted your dare,” said Grantaire.

“Good job,” said Enjolras without irony, and now that Grantaire knew the game was perfectly innocent from Enjolras’s side, she felt especially guilty at what those words did to her. The trouble was, she couldn’t think of an excuse to call off the game that wouldn’t reveal her own depravity. Well, Grantaire could survive another two innocuous, safe commands. She was already a third done, after all.

“Next dare,” Grantaire prompted.

Enjolras looked thoughtful. “Can I be certain you’ll use your veto? I don’t want to make you do anything you don’t really want to do.”

“I didn’t want to stop calling you Diana,” Grantaire pointed out.

“Yes,” said Enjolras, “why is that?”

Grantaire bit her lip. She had a guess of what was coming.

“I dare you to tell me why you wanted to keep calling me Diana.”

“Veto,” Grantaire bit out. “Pass.”

Enjolras nodded slowly. There was a heavy feeling in the room. Grantaire wasn’t sure how to dispel it.

“One more,” said Grantaire unnecessarily. “Make it count.” 

“And you’re certain you’ll use your veto if you need to?”

“I just did, didn’t I?”

“Yes,” said Enjolras, “So you’re certain?”

Grantaire fought the urge to roll her eyes. “For crying out loud, Di—Enjolras. Sorry,” she added.

But Enjolras looked thoughtful. “If it’s that much trouble for you, then you can say it.”

“It bothers you,” Grantaire protested.

“Less and less,” said Enjolras. “You are certain?”

“Yes,” said Grantaire, thinking in that instant that she would happily do anything Enjolras asked of her. Prepare a four-course meal. Learn shorthand. Send a whole parcel of drawings to  _ The Ladder _ —

“I dare you to take off your robe,” said Enjolras.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> All of the lyrics of “Prove it on Me” are accurate. Allegedly, Ma Rainey wrote it in response to rumors that she’d been arrested for hosting an orgy at her house involving multiple women.
> 
> The Bessie Smith lyrics are from “The Boy in The Boat,” a song she covered. (I couldn’t find the Bessie Smith version on YouTube, so here’s [George Hannah singing it](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V9GPI48p4SQ).) The titular boy and boat is a reference to female genetalia. Smith was married, although she also had both male and female lovers.
> 
> The notion that the situation for lesbians was better in the Philippines came from an off-hand comment in [the unreleased 1988 documentary](http://herstories.prattinfoschool.nyc/omeka/exhibits/show/daughters-of-bilitis-video-pro/an-unreleased-documentary) referenced in last chapter’s notes.
> 
> World War Two comparatively offered a lot of opportunity and freedoms for lesbians, both in terms of increased financial independence and groups like the Women’s Army Corps, which brought together women from all over the country and thus allowed women from small or remote towns to realize they weren’t the only one. 
> 
> (A fun story is that in 1947, then-General Eisenhower summoned WAC member Nell “Johnnie” Phelps, informing her it had come to his attention that there were lesbians in the WAC and telling her to ferret out who they were so they could all be discharged. She is said to have replied, "If the General pleases, sir, I'll be happy to do that, but the first name on the list will be mine." To which his secretary added, “"If the General pleases, sir, my name will be first and hers will be second." Phelps then made the case for the lesbians in the WACs, pointing out they were one of the most decorated groups and that there had been no charges of illegal conduct or illegitimate pregnancies, and Eisenhower let the idea drop. Phelps was later honorably discharged from the army and went on to be an activist in the 1970s.)
> 
> Grantaire is referring to the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League, made famous in the movie _A League of Their Own_. Interestingly, if you’ve ever wondered why in that movie there’s so much emphasis on the players appearing ladylike, it’s at least partly due to anxieties at the time about players possibly being lesbians. Women were fired from the AAGPBL [just for getting a haircut that read as too butch.](https://narratively.com/the-hidden-queer-history-behind-a-league-of-their-own/)
> 
> Enjolras and her family came to America in 1946, when the quota of Filipinx people doubled from 50 to 100. 
> 
> The first Kinsey report, concerning men, came out in 1948. The second, concerning women, came out in 1953.
> 
>  _Invasion of the Body Snatchers_ came out in 1956. It’s the source of the expression “pod people,” as in people hiding in plain sight who Aren’t Like Us. It’s been interpreted as anti-communist or anti-McCarthyism or even as taking both positions simultaneously.
> 
> Homosexuality was removed as a straightforward disorder in the DSM in 1973, as a culmination of a lot of developments. There is [a very good episode of This American Life](https://www.thisamericanlife.org/204/81-words) about how exactly that happened.


	6. Chapter 6

Grantaire took a step back, directly into the edge of the countertop. “What?”

“Sorry,” said Enjolras, and the unbelievable part was, she really did look contrite. Stricken, even. She crossed her arms. “I promise you, I won’t ask again. That was completely—”

“No!” said Grantaire, too quickly and too loud. “No.” She took a breath and collected herself. “I mean—why would you want...?”

This seemed to brighten Enjolras’s spirits. “Oh dear,” she said, almost wryly. “If you can’t  _ tell _ , then I’m not doing a very good job.”

Grantaire shook her head. She took another breath. “Why  _ now _ , Enjolras?”

Enjolras put her hands in her pockets, boyish. “Of all the ways I saw this happening or not happening,” she said, “I didn’t think I’d need to convince you of my interest.”

“Yes, well, you do,” said Grantaire shortly.

“Because you’re clever,” said Enjolras, and Grantaire’s mouth dropped open. “You’re clever and you’re funny, even when you’re using those gifts to make my life more difficult.” Enjolras added with the air of one admitting a great secret, “Sometimes even then. Because you’re fond of my friends—our friends—and you make amends when you do say the wrong thing. Because although you pretend not to care, I think you care very, very, very much. Because it turns out we can have a civil conversation.” Their eyes met. Enjolras’s gaze turned scorching. “And frankly, because I think you are the sort who wants someone to tell her what to do in bed, and I would very much like to be that person.”

Grantaire struggled for words. She struggled for  _ air _ . She was grateful that the countertop at least held her up.

“Are you certain?” she finally managed.

“Yes,” said Enjolras, “Of course I’m—oh. You were mocking me.”

“A little.” Grantaire smiled. To her surprise, Enjolras smiled back.

“Does this mean you’re over your nerves now?” 

“I think so,” said Grantaire.

Enjolras took a step closer. “Good. Shall I ask you again?”

“No need.” Grantaire laughed shakily. “I remember it very clearly.”

“Good,” said Enjolras again, smile widening.

Grantaire fiddled with the belt of her robe, biting her lip. Enjolras gave her a small nod, and somehow that was what gave her the courage to untie the belt and let the whole mess drop to the floor in a heap of terrycloth and dried paint.

When she looked up, Enjolras was watching her intently. Grantaire fought the urge to somehow apologize for her small tits and soft stomach, to strike a ridiculous pose and make the whole thing a joke. 

Enjolras’s chest rose and fell. Finally, she said in a low voice, “Can I kiss you?”

Grantaire nodded frantically, and Enjolras crossed the room in about three strides. She placed a careful hand on the nape of Grantaire’s neck. Grantaire didn’t pretend not to lean into the touch. Enjolras reached up and unraveled Grantaire’s hair from its braid, running her fingers lightly over Grantaire’s scalp. Grantaire shivered.

“Are you cold?” said Enjolras. 

Heat was rising off Grantaire’s body everywhere that Enjolras had looked at her. “No. I—” Grantaire broke off because Enjolras was kissing her. It was impossible to speak with Enjolras’s mouth on hers. It was nearly impossible to  _ stand _ . Enjolras kissed with single-minded determination and force, overwhelming in a way that made something deep inside Grantaire squirm happily. Grantaire’s back hit the edge of the countertop again and Enjolras wordlessly lifted her onto it, making an approving noise into her mouth when Grantaire wrapped both legs around Enjolras’s waist.

Grantaire lost track of time completely. Minutes or hours could have passed, she had no idea. She’d never known anything as helplessly arousing as Enjolras kissing her relentlessly in the middle of her brightly lit kitchen. 

When they paused to breathe, Enjolras pressed their foreheads together. Her hands were in Grantaire’s hair again. Grantaire could’ve purred. Still, the Formica was starting to get clammy against her skin.

“Would you—” Grantaire started as Enjolras tugged lightly. Grantaire’s eyes slipped closed. “Mmm, would you care to, ah—” Enjolras had tugged her hair again, experimental. “Stop that.”

Enjolras’s hands stilled. “You like it,” she said, radiating smugness.

“Of course I like it, it feels amazing,” said Grantaire. “But, as I was saying, much as I enjoy desecrating my kitchen, do you suppose we could move this to my bed?”

The fingers in her hair tightened. “Yes.”

Grantaire scrambled to hop off the countertop. Enjolras stopped her with a palm to the sternum. “Please,” said Enjolras with a half-smile. “Allow me.”

“If you insist,” said Grantaire, and then Enjolras did something she couldn’t really follow that ended with Enjolras cradling Grantaire in her arms, one arm under the crook of Grantaire’s knees and the other supporting her bare back.

“How—” Grantaire yelped, laughing. 

“Bridal carry,” said Enjolras, as if that explained everything. 

“Oh,” said Grantaire. A strangely solemn look passed between them. Grantaire swallowed. “Will you kiss me?” she said. Enjolras bent her neck and kissed Grantaire on the mouth just once. It felt less like a plundering this time, and more like sealing a contract, Grantaire thought nonsensically, as Enjolras walked them to the bedroom and laid her down on the tangled sheets.

Grantaire felt a laugh bubble up inside her.

“Enjolras,” she said, “Oh no, Enjolras,  _ heavens _ , there’s only one bed! However will we manage? However will we  _ cope _ ?”

Enjolras snorted. “I don’t know,” she said. “I suppose we’ll have to get creative, R.”

“Grantaire.”

“What?” said Enjolras.

“I think I’d prefer you use my real name,” she said. “Which is Grantaire.”

Enjolras nodded, eyes intent. That odd solemnity again.

“And anyway,” said Grantaire, “if you’re actually a government agent, at this point you’re  _ astonishingly  _ dedicated.”

Enjolras swatted Grantaire’s thigh with surprising gentleness and said, “My name  _ is  _ Enjolras, if you’re wondering.”

“You gave them your real name on day one?” said Grantaire.

“Yes,” said Enjolras. She leaned in to kiss Grantaire again. “I was tired of hiding. Now let’s see, where were we?”

“You were driving me out of my mind,” said Grantaire helpfully. “I suppose that is one advantage to this situation, that you finally have a way to shut me up.”

Enjolras’s eyes flashed. “Suppose I want you loud.”

“That’s, uh.” Grantaire felt the last of her common sense teetering off a cliff. “I would—I would like that very much, but the walls here are thin,” she managed.

“Damn it,” said Enjolras. “Well, we’ll have to get together at my place next.”

They were apparently going to do this at least twice. Grantaire’s heart soared, and for the first time, she felt emboldened to say, “Do you think you might take off something, too?” She gestured between them. “We’re a bit mismatched.” 

“Oh!” said Enjolras easily, “yes, of course.” She leaned back to unbutton her shirt, and Grantaire tried not to stare too obviously at the growing slice of collarbone and white bra. Enjolras shrugged the shirt off, stood up, and started in on her trousers. Grantaire, who had begun to theorize that maybe Enjolras was secretly shy about her body, rethought several conclusions.

“Did you  _ forget  _ to take your clothes off,” Grantaire said, barely restraining a giggle.

Enjolras kicked off her trousers. She wasn’t wearing any kind of corset, which was hardly a shock, or a girdle, which in retrospect also made sense.

“I was distracted,” said Enjolras, with a pointed look at Grantaire’s naked body. Grantaire could feel herself starting to blush, could feel the blush spread from her face down to her sternum. Enjolras watched with interest, then unhooked her bra and stepped out of her underwear. 

Grantaire attempted not to let her eyes bug out of her head, then gave up and stared.

Enjolras raised an eyebrow, a move which it turned out did not lose its effect naked.

“I’ve lost the thread,” Grantaire said eventually. “Am I allowed to call you a goddess or not?”

“If you must,” said Enjolras, not really sounding that put out about it. She crawled back onto the bed, looked at Grantaire consideringly for a moment, and then gently took Grantaire’s left arm by the wrist, stroking at the thin skin over the pulse point. Grantaire smiled. Enjolras’s other hand wrapped around Grantaire’s right wrist, and then in a blink, she had both of Grantaire’s wrists pinned above her head on the pillow.

“Oh,” said Grantaire, breathless, eyes wide, “hello there.”

“Hi,” said Enjolras. “All that talk about being tied up, I thought perhaps—”

“Correctly!” Grantaire babbled. “You thought correctly! You win the sixty-four-thousand dollar prize, it’s all yours!”

“Which is…?” Enjolras said, biting kisses down Grantaire’s throat. Grantaire hoped it would bruise just a little; she could wear her most conservative dress to work tomorrow and admire the marks later, alone.

“Ah,” said Grantaire. “Uh.” How could lips, tongue and teeth feel so  _ good _ ? “If you’re willing to release me for a moment and lie down, I have a few ideas.”

  
  


Grantaire had not done this since art school, and she hadn’t cared so much about getting it right back then. She rested her chin on her new vantage point, atop Enjolras’s thigh. 

“I’m a little rusty,” Grantaire admitted. “If you could, uh, give me some guidance—”

Enjolras reached down and swept the hair out of Grantaire’s face. “Happy to,” she said. “I’ve certainly thought about this enough.”

“Really,” said Grantaire.

“You have a very expressive mouth,” said Enjolras. Grantaire kissed below her navel, just above where the coarse hair started. She pressed several kisses to Enjolras’s stomach, and one, open-mouthed, to the back of her left knee.

Enjolras shuddered minutely. “Stop  _ teasing _ ,” she said, somehow sounding both commanding and out of breath.

Grantaire grinned. “My pleasure.”

It really was. Grantaire had forgotten how much she liked the act itself—the taste, the direct line on her partner’s enjoyment, even the messiness of it had a visceral appeal.

And then of course, it was Enjolras moving underneath her mouth, Enjolras tugging on her hair in encouragement, Enjolras quietly gasping, “Can you—little circles, like— _ oh _ , like that, just like that, Christ, yes!” If Grantaire thought about that for too long, she would jitter out of her skin, but it helped to have a task to focus on, and coaxing more of those breathy sounds out of Enjolras was the worthiest goal Grantaire could dream of. 

They really would need to try this again in Enjolras’s apparently soundproof apartment. Grantaire got the sense Enjolras was working hard not to make noise, which was a shame. When after some hazy amount of time later, Enjolras arched off the bed, going taut and then very relaxed, Grantaire looked up and saw she was biting her fist. 

“Careful,” Grantaire murmured against the soft inside of Enjolras’s thigh. 

Enjolras lay still for a moment and then grasped Grantaire by the shoulders, pulling her up. Grantaire gave the ticklish spot on Enjolras’s stomach a parting kiss and allowed herself to be tugged until they were face to face again. Enjolras pulled her down for a kiss.

“I’m filthy,” Grantaire protested.

“Yes,” said Enjolras. They kissed.

“Do you,” Grantaire panted against her lips after several more kisses, “want to go again? Can you?”

“Maybe later.”

“I’ll mark it in my calendar,” said Grantaire.

They regarded each other. Enjolras was so beautiful with her hair sweaty and sticking up in several directions on the pillow.

“Can I touch you?” said Enjolras.

All of Grantaire’s cleverness deserted her. “Please.”

“Here,” said Enjolras, “Like this.” Gently but firmly, she moved Grantaire into the position she wanted: Grantaire lying on her back, Enjolras braced above her.

Enjolras reached out and petted Grantaire’s side, then pulled her into another series of bruising kisses. Her hand trailed down to Grantaire’s knee.

“A little northwards, maybe,” said Grantaire against her lips.

“I’m getting there,” said Enjolras. “Just enjoying the journey.”

“Oh, are you?” said Grantaire, pulling back a little to fix Enjolras with a look. “Gee, how wonderful for you, I’m really glad that—” Enjolras’s hand slipped between her legs, stroking very lightly.

“Glad that—?” Enjolras prompted.

“Ah,” said Grantaire, bucking her hips as the tentative strokes grew more assured. “Just, you know, generally glad.”

Enjolras laughed, not unkindly. Without taking her eyes off Grantaire’s face, she slowly slipped one finger inside her, where Grantaire was mortifyingly wet. Grantaire gasped.

Enjolras hummed, pleased. “What do you like?”

_ You _ . “Anything,” Grantaire breathed.

“You can’t mean  _ anything _ ,” said Enjolras reasonably. Her finger traced a small pattern, making Grantaire gasp again.

“Just—” If Grantaire had thought herself beyond blushing before, she clearly had a ways to go after all. “If you could—more of that, and. Uh. Keep talking?”

  
  


“—did so well for me,” Enjolras was saying. “I love what you can do with your lips and your tongue, you’re so talented. Would you like another finger?”

Well past words, Grantaire made a kind of whimpering sound. With some effort, she nodded.

“I love how much you love it,” said Enjolras. The pressure, the motion, the words were exactly what Grantaire needed. She could feel the orgasm building. “That’s almost as good, knowing how wet you are, just from using your mouth on me,” Enjolras said. “You really do love it, don’t you?”

Grantaire choked back a moan.

“That’s right,” said Enjolras soothingly. “That’s right. God, you’re perfect like this, Grantaire. You’re perfect—”

She came so hard her ears rang.

  
  


Grantaire opened her eyes. It was very bright; they hadn’t bothered to turn off any of the lights. She glanced over at the clock. The hour hand helpfully pointed at 3. Three in the morning, God. 

She realized her mistake then. This wasn’t art school; Enjolras couldn’t just throw on her clothes and slink back down the hall, and Grantaire couldn’t leave because it was her apartment. Grantaire stood, flicked the lights off, and crawled back onto her narrow slice of the bed. Hopefully, Enjolras was asleep.

As if on cue, Enjolras rolled over. Dimly Grantaire could see that her hair was still sticking up. “You said you were a cuddler,” she said, almost accusing.

“I say all kinds of things,” Grantaire said.

Enjolras regarded her in the darkness for a long time. “You don’t lie.”

“No,” Grantaire agreed. It was hard not to hold Enjolras in a bed this small. Not just emotionally, but spatially. It took work.

She thought of attending meetings after this, of trying to behave in a way that wouldn’t prompt questions from their friends. Of sitting in the back of the room and heckling every word Enjolras said like she had never heard Enjolras call her  _ perfect _ . She couldn’t do it, she realized. There was nothing for it.

“About doing this again,” Grantaire made herself say.

“You should come at six,” said Enjolras. “After work some day this week. We’ll have to eat at my place, the two of us would attract too much attention at a restaurant. I can’t exactly cook but I’ll make us sandwiches and heat up some soup—”

“I don’t think we should,” said Grantaire to the ceiling.

“Oh,” said Enjolras quietly.

“Yeah.” Grantaire winced.

“I thought,” said Enjolras. She broke off. “Did I make you do anything you didn’t—”

“No,” said Grantaire. “No, no. You were fine. You were—”  _ Perfect _ . “Fine. I just—”

“What,” said Enjolras.

The worst part was, she probably did owe Enjolras the truth. She watched the shadows on the ceiling for a long moment, searching.

“This may be easy for you,” said Grantaire at last. “But it’s not for me.” She could feel Enjolras looking at her. “I have—” Grantaire sighed. “Feelings. For you. So. It’s better for both of us if we don’t.”

“I think,” said Enjolras, “I might have given you the wrong idea.” 

Grantaire turned to face her. It put their faces inches apart.

“Can you really not—even after—” started Enjolras. Grantaire’s heart began to very cautiously flutter. “I don’t do anything lightly,” she said.

“You don’t,” Grantaire agreed. “Although.” She coaxed a bit of a smile onto her face. “Are you certain this isn’t some sort of outreach for the Cause? A campaign to make one girl less ashamed of her woman-loving ways?” 

“Am I doing this politically?”

“Well,” said Grantaire, and she could feel the pretense of the joke fall in on itself like a bad souffle. “Yes.”

“No,” said Enjolras. With one finger, she traced down the line of Grantaire’s nose, ending on her lower lip. “There are some matters where I’d like to convince you otherwise, but this isn’t about that, not really.” Grantaire kissed the tip of her finger and she smiled. “This is, if anything, about no longer pretending to myself that I don’t know precisely what I want,” she said. “I like you.”

Grantaire swallowed. “I like you, too.”

“Combeferre says I don’t date, I court,” said Enjolras.

“What do  _ you  _ say,” said Grantaire, heart thumping like a kickdrum.

Enjolras reached over and took Grantaire’s hand. She turned it over gently, then brought it to her lips and kissed it.

“Grantaire,” said Enjolras, “will you be my girl?”

  
  
  


The office hallway was empty when Grantaire stepped out of the elevator on Monday morning, only ten minutes late.

“ _ Fly me to the moon _ ,” Grantaire sang in a passable Kaye Ballard, “ _ and let me dance among the stars.”  _

She’d woken up early with the song stuck in her head, had hummed it all through frying up enough pancakes for two, had only faltered when she looked over to see Enjolras standing in the bedroom doorway, wearing only a shirt and watching her.

“What?” Grantaire had said.

Enjolras had started, looking almost embarrassed. “Nothing. You’re a good singer.” And then, without a word, Enjolras had held out her hand.

To say they had danced then would’ve been an exaggeration. Enjolras knew no footwork, apparently. What they’d done was simply swayed, holding each other, as Grantaire continued to sing.

_ “Let me hear what Spring is like on Jupiter and Mars…”  _ sang Grantaire now, doing an impromptu little box step on the nondescript office carpet.

Chester rounded the corner. “Grantaire, did you just get here?” he said. “You’re late.”

“I know,” said Grantaire. She said it with the same lips Enjolras had kissed just forty-five minutes before. It was like a wonderful dream, except Grantaire had plans that evening, and a mark, low on her clavicle, safely hidden by her work blouse. Chester passed her. “ _ In other words, hold my hand... _ ”

“Someone’s chipper,” said Chester. From over his shoulder, he gave a sneer that was nominally hidden as a smile. “Did you finally meet a nice boy?”

Grantaire smiled dreamily. “No.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Some women still wore a kind of corset in the 1950’s. Girdles, although still often considered uncomfortable, were seen as more comfortable than a corset, and [“were still a required undergarment for most dress and even pant shapes of the 1950s.”](https://vintagedancer.com/1950s/1950s-lingerie/) Did I write Grantaire in a bathrobe for the sexual tension, or so that I wouldn’t have to write her trying to seductively wriggle out of a girdle? History’s mysteries!
> 
> Boy, there’s nothing like writing a sex scene where you have the creeping horror that probably neither party has been fully educated about what even to call certain key parts of their anatomy. I actually did some research into contemporary the terms people used for cunnilingus, thanks to [this resource,](https://io9.gizmodo.com/three-timelines-of-slang-terms-for-having-sex-from-135-1608522982) but ultimately felt like it might all be distracting, and so decided to simply dance furiously around the issue.
> 
> Del Martin and Phyllis Lyon, two key figures in the early DOB, were married in 2004, when they were in their eighties. It was the first same-sex wedding to take place in San Francisco. The marriage was voided by the California Supreme Court later that same year. They were remarried on June 16, 2008. Martin died shortly after.
> 
> Kaye Ballard was the first to sing what became “Fly Me to the Moon,” in 1954. You can listen to her version [here.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mcwlGjDNkkw)

**Author's Note:**

> The basic conceit of this first part—a closeted homosexual lady being taken to a lesbian bar by straight people as a “joke” and encountering an attractive lesbian there—I borrowed shamelessly from _I Am a Woman,_ a lesbian pulp novel written in 1959 by Ann Bannon. In my defense, going to gay bars just to gawk does seem to be a thing straight city people did back in the day.
> 
> I know nothing about Rothko. If you do, please feel free to tell me what Grantaire was right about.
> 
> It was fairly common for midcentury gay bars to be run by the mob. The Stonewall Inn, site of the famous Stonewall Riots, was also mob-run. Interestingly (horrifyingly), the Stonewall didn’t have running water at the main bar; they washed their glasses in a bucket. This makes me wonder if the Musain ten years earlier would’ve even had a sink in the bathroom, but let’s not linger on that.
> 
> Asian people were pretty rare at this period in the U.S. because we’d had pretty strict and very racist quotas about how many were allowed to immigrate. Grantaire doesn’t know it yet but Enjolras is Filipina in this story. This is a sort of tribute to Rose Bamberger. Slightly more on her in a later historical note.
> 
> I wondered about having Grantaire refer to “light years” but the term has apparently been around since the 19th century. The more you know!
> 
> “Sex perverts” was one of the terms connected with gays and lesbians at the time. Grantaire’s self-hatred may be the most historically accurate detail about this story.
> 
> “Lesbian” was considered a fairly shocking word in the 1950s, which is why the Daughters of Bilitis newsletter _The Ladder_ referred to a woman attracted to women as a “variant” or a homosexual.
> 
> “Ol’ Joe” is a reference to Joe McCarthy, of course, father of the anti-communist witch hunt. It maybe goes without saying that as a lesbian, Grantaire would’ve had considerably more to fear from McCarthy and his followers; they were obsessed with ferreting out closeted gay people.
> 
> The song Grantaire sings while making coffee is Dream a Little Dream of Me, specifically [the Ella Fitzgerald and Louie Armstrong version.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gxrws7omOHQ)
> 
> “Diet pills” at the time promised to give you more energy, which I guess is true, but they were basically just meth, so it’s good Grantaire didn’t try them.
> 
> Shorthand is a note-taking system that was used by secretaries before dictaphones were common. Basically it’s a cipher that lets you write really, really fast and hopefully be able to read it later. Combeferre’s shorthand is impeccable.
> 
> The story about a professor gently dissuading a woman away from a career in the sciences I got from my grandma, who wanted to be a chemist and instead became a nurse and later a teacher. She always maintained she was grateful to him.
> 
> Hippolyta was queen of the Amazons.


End file.
